Evangelism, Church Planting, & Discipleship

The long-term solution to poverty, disease, and hopelessness in Nairobi – as well as in the rest of the world – is to help the poor understand who they are in Christ and assist them in making physical and spiritual changes in their lives. As these changes take hold, Christ’s love will be shared with others, breaking the chain of bleakness and despair and replacing it with hope that can bring about individual and community transformation

With that goal in mind, Hope Partnership guides the poor to a relationship with Jesus Christ and His Church as the ultimate answer to their physical and spiritual needs.

The CMF missionaries place great emphasis on meeting people at their point of need and sharing the gospel organically. They use a variety of tools to do this, including the “Jesus Film,” the “evange-cube,” drama, “open-air” preaching rallies and short-term mission trips. Many are also won to Christ through Community Health Evangelism activities or through follow-up with the parents of children sponsored by the Hope Partnership program to attend a Missions of Hope school in the slums.

The new Christians receive follow-up home visits from Hope’s trained social workers or Community Health Evangelists, who offer Bible teaching and discipleship. They are formed into home Bible study or cell groups for further teaching and spiritual growth. As they discover their ministry gifts and skills, they learn to use them in the group, and reach out to win others to Christ. When the number in a fellowship reaches around 50, the group is “launched” as a church and begins meeting on Sundays. Short-term trip teams that come to do medical and community work provide additional energy to fuel the growth of the church. The goal of CMF’s Nairobi team is to plant a church in every Missions of Hope education center.

New Christians in the urban churches need a great deal of preparation before they can take on church leadership positions, so Hope places a high value on intensive and ongoing training. Edinah Konje and Joseph Seleti, two national Christians, coordinate the mission’s discipleship programs, providing Bible teaching and training and leading new Christians into avenues of service in the church.

Additional training comes through the Community Health Evangelism (CHE) program and also through strong, expository Bible teaching in the churches themselves.