This is Part 1 of 2. In Part 1 below, we explore the challenges faced by Filipino believers and why training indigenous pastors is urgent and essential. In Part 2, we’ll share how God raised up Abraham Ramos to strengthen the church from within by training faithful men to teach, shepherd, and lead.
What is the value of training a pastor?
Why dedicate the time, effort, resources, and capacity to train indigenous men? What is the end product of the sacrifice, study, planning, and persecution that these men will face?
It’s for the people.
Why Train a Pastor? It’s for the People.
The people who make up the global Church. The people whose entire lives will be transformed by God through His word. His people, chosen by Him, whom these pastors will care for, protect, teach, and shepherd. The people who will taste Heaven in the sweet community of a healthy, mature church.
It’s for Christ’s church around the world, living in all different cultures and contexts, facing all different circumstances and challenges. All who will find peace and joy in His word.
And it’s happening all over the world.
The product of faulty doctrine is weak churches, ineffective to serve the people.
The Need Is Global—And Urgent.
One such nation where trained pastors are fiercely needed is the Philippines.
On these islands, there are numerous boundaries between a Christian and faithful living. Varying religious backgrounds must be fought against. A Westerner may understand living in cultural and religious diversity but may not fully appreciate the tension of living in a nation where false religion dominates the culture, worldview, and society. It colors everything around, like a sepia-toned filter.
Where Christian worldview is scarce, false gods will cling to the peoples’ hearts. The Philippines is teeming with worldviews that are actively antagonistic towards a Christian’s understanding of the world and desire to live faithfully in it. The truth is not only rare, it is actively rejected.
This is where a healthy church is a true respite and haven. A place of truth, encouragement, and rest for the Christian.
In the Philippines, False Hope Is the Norm.
However, sound theological education and preaching is few and far between.
In the Philippines, poverty is not the exception—it is the rule. Faithful men who desire to pastor churches often cannot afford seminary; they must grasp at whatever resource they can to learn to preach. Unfortunately, this means grasping onto false teaching and learning from flawed theology.
And the product of faulty doctrine is weak churches, ineffective to serve the people.
The very people who live in this poverty, who too must grasp at whatever is available in search of hope. And in the Philippines, the prosperity “gospel” reigns, offering only false hope to suffering, striving people.
Yet the Lord is always at work, as He was at working in the life and heart of Abraham Ramos.
This is Part 1 of 2. In Part 2, we’ll share how God raised up Abraham to strengthen the church from within by training faithful men to teach, shepherd, and lead.
