Busy trip to East Asia

A eclectic team of American Christians from several different churches, led by a CMF staff member, visited CMF’s East Asia team in late June. Members of the group ranged from a 20-something female college graduate to a 70-something retiree, but each person used his unique testimony to share aspects of God’s love with the Asian friends he met there. This small group of six hit the ground running to help the team with three major projects: a biblical seminar, a special migrant school English class and home visits with families in the poor migrant community.

The three-day biblical seminar was held for the members a Bible study group that one of the resident team members has been leading for the past several months. Three of the six short-termers prepared short talks on important life lessons based on biblical morality. The topics included dating and marriage, finance and forgiveness. The group members were encouraged to bring friends, so more than 50 people crammed into the small room for the sessions. Many had no knowledge of God or the Bible. A local house church followed up with many of the students for future discipleship.

The next project for the group was initiating an English tutoring program at a new migrant school. The group tutored elementary students in basic English in preparation for their exams during three sessions. More than 150 students spoke English to foreign white faces for the first time. The school principal was very appreciative of the help and excited about the team’s home visitation program.

Finally, the short-term trip group also assisted the team with several home visits. After prayer walks through the neighborhood, they made follow-up visits to poor families that the team has been working with. The families welcomed the visiting Americans into their homes and thanked them for teaching English to their children. The short-termers were able to see the heart of the CMF’s team’s ministry with these families and pray with them.

In addition to these projects, team members assisted at multiple Bible studies at government-approved churches and met with other local partners. Though the trip was a quick 10 days, the long-term CMF Marketplace Ministry team reports that they accomplished several tasks that they could not have done alone. The group demonstrated that short-term teams can be a vital part of overseas ministries when properly utilized. “They were a great encouragement to our team and spurred us on to continue the work,” wrote one MM worker.