Mission Description Summary
A Global Gates Missions Catalyst’s primary task is to develop and implement a comprehensive plan to reach a particular unreached people group, or affinity of unreached people groups, with the gospel of Jesus Christ.
The Missions Catalyst builds an ecosystem of prayer, ministry, evangelism, discipleship, church multiplication, and leadership development that, through the power of the Holy Spirit, births a multiplication of disciples and churches throughout the prioritized people group and beyond.
Major Responsibilities and Function
- Become an expert on the Afghan refugee situation as well as the various differences in cultures among Afghans.
- Develop and/or obtain gospel resources (Bibles, audio Scripture, chronological Bible stories, testimonies, videos, etc.) in the various languages.
- Raise up laborers among Afghans, and recruit laborers from outside of the people group, to saturate the people group with the gospel.
- Nurture a vision for the spread of the gospel, multiplication of disciples, and planting of churches among Afghans in Raleigh/Durham and through them to other communities of Afghans around the world.
- Create and implement a comprehensive prayer, ministry, evangelism, discipleship, church planting, and leadership development strategy to stimulate church multiplication movements among these groups.
- Continually learn and implement best practices in church multiplication.
- Collaborate with other evangelicals to model and train in evangelism, disciple making, church planting, and leadership development.
- As new believers emerge, give primary attention to them to nurture their role in leading multiplying movements of disciples and churches.
- Evaluate and adapt methods based on what God has done and is doing.
- Start multiple streams of disciple making and church planting to reach all population segments and networks of Afghans within Raleigh/Durham and their communities worldwide.
Unreached People Group Information
Concentrated Area: Raleigh/Durham, NC
Population Estimate in the Triangle of NC: 5,000
Primary Religion: Islam
Primary Languages: Pashto, Dari, Hazaragi, Pashai
Why is This Position Needed?
Afghan refugees are being resettled in many parts of Raleigh and Durham. Multiple resettlement agencies exist here and are placing refugees wherever housing is available. Afghans are not simply from one tribe, but represent many different ethnolinguistic groups and, therefore, need the gospel presented through different cultural lenses. The Missions Catalyst will need to keep this in mind while developing cultural bridges to the gospel across multiple language groups.
Location
The Afghan refugee families can be found throughout the Triangle, but are mainly located in certain housing complexes in Raleigh and Durham. These apartments have more saturated populations of refugees. Working alongside partner organizations, existing refugee ministries and local church partners will be keys in finding and reaching these people with the good news of Jesus.
Accountability
- Submit short monthly reports to a coach or supervisor.
- Submit an annual report to Global Gates leadership.
- Meet or video conference with the assigned Global Gates coach once a month to evaluate and strengthen the work.
Training
Global Gates offers customized training for our missionaries called Gateways as well as providing coaching through the entire process. Depending on the missionary’s prior experience, Gateways could involve building skills in language learning, ethnographic research, mobilizing and training partners, spiritual formation, evangelism and discipleship, church planting methodology and leadership. To become an effective Missions Catalyst, the missionary candidate may need to develop particular skills first. Global Gates offers a one-week Missions Catalyst training and ongoing coaching to assist missionaries in their task.
Team Member Characteristics
- Missionary Qualifications – Must meet the general missionary qualifications required for Global Gates missionaries.
- Visionary – The Missions Catalyst needs to envision what God desires for the people group in a particular gateway city and through the people group’s communities around the world.
- Spiritually Mature – The Missions Catalyst needs to be spiritually mature and committed to sound evangelical beliefs and practices. He or she must know and obey God’s Word and point others to the authority of God’s Word. The Missions Catalyst must be a person of integrity. He or she is a person of prayer who expects God to demonstrate power in bringing the prioritized people group to Christ.
- Strategic – The Missions Catalyst needs to align tools, time, relationships and resources, to accomplish God’s vision for the people group. He or she is strategic in partnering with the larger Body of Christ to accomplish more than one can do alone or on a small team.
- Intentional, focused, and disciplined – The Missions Catalyst needs to be a self-starter who is able to avoid distractions to maximize evangelism, discipleship and church multiplication among the prioritized people group. The Missions Catalyst must discern what is most fruitful to do with his or her time, and with whom that time should be spent.
- A Learner – The Missions Catalyst must be a lifelong learner committed to learning and sharing best practices for Kingdom advance among his or her people group.
- Passionate – The Missions Catalyst must have a sense of urgency. Members of the unreached people group are lost and dying every day without Jesus Christ.
- Faith-Filled Perseverance – The Missions Catalyst has faith that God will reach the prioritized people group. When obstacles arise, the Missions Catalyst tenaciously perseveres, clinging to the vision of the Lord birthing a church planting movement among the people group.