Audiomission From Cms

Effective mission can look very different from place to place and at Church Mission Society we are very committed to taking different cultures and contexts seriously. But training and study naturally form part of our mission commitment all around the world – and provide an ideal situation for mutual learning, as we hear from Berdine van den Toren. We also meet someone who is working in India to facilitate theological training for all sorts of people who would not otherwise have access to it – and hear about the transforming effect it has. And we turn to the Middle East and to our mission partners Nabil and Sarah Shehadi, who are the coordinators for Alpha in the Levant region, from Syria around the east coast of the Mediterranean. They run Alpha and Marriage courses, and train others to run them.

As the summer rolls on, the first phase of Church Mission Society's ‘Mission is’ campaign is in full flow – as we try to gather ‘the big picture’ of what people really think about mission – what it is, and who should be involved. As a result of this, you won’t be surprised that we are hoping to prompt more people to follow their own call to mission – whether that’s across the sea or across the road. If you haven’t taken part yet, please go to churchmissionsociety.org/mi and complete our short, fun survey. And in this edition of Audiomission, we meet four people who talk about how they have discovered their own call and put it into action. We meet Phil and Sylvie Good, who are preparing to go and help serve Syrian refugees in Lebanon. We also meet Michael Green, who has put his call into action in both Jordan and Ipswich – despite serious epilepsy. First we talk to Dr Ruth Hulser, who has spent 14 years in Tanzania, working in a health centre in a small town, and developing a holistic mission communi

Our theme this month is practical spirituality – faith addressing the concrete realities of everyday life. We talk to Mark Scandrette from the USA, who encourages people to align their time and money with what matters most – and also has an intriguing perspective on the church in the UK – as art museum. We’ll also be digging in to some of the financial freedom training offered by our sister society CMS-Africa, seeing how it fits into their big vision. That's through the experience of CMS gap year participant Ed Hutton. But first we hear from Dennis Tongoi, executive director of CMS-Africa, who have an astonishing vision to reach 50 million families by 2050 – yes, you heard right, 50 million.

This month’s podcast is inspired by the Archbishop of Canterbury’s Thy Kingdom Come initiative, in which Church Mission Society is joining along with many other organisations and churches around the world. You can find out more by searching online for Thy Kingdom Come and we hope many of our listeners will pledge to pray during the wave of prayer for more people to know Jesus from 25 May to 4 June. Our interviews this month touch on a few of the many ways we are seeing God at work, examples of that kingdom coming – on earth as it is in heaven. First we meet Bishop Anthony Poggo from South Sudan. He was until last year Bishop of Kajo-Keji in South Sudan. Now he has taken up the role of the archbishop of Canterbury’s adviser on Anglican Communion affairs. We also hear from northern Argentina and our mission partners there Catherine Le Tissier and Bishop Nick Drayson. They spoke to Jonathan Self about two fruits of much prayer: AMARE, the still-new women’s movement Catherine helped start and some new indig

This month we continue our world tour, reaching Latin America. And we start off in Brazil with Olympic memories and new plans in Rio. then we move to Peru and Chile looking at discipleship and church planting. Featuring: Alex and Jane Cacouris and their three children are based at Christ Church in Rio de Janeiro alongside mission partners Jess and Mark Simpson. Paul and Sarah Tester, now with their three young children, have been serving the church in Peru for 10 years. In Chile, Alf and Hilary Cooper had a significant change to their work when Alf was appointed an auxiliary bishop for church planting.

This month our world tour continues into Africa and we meet three local partners of Church Mission Society there – all gathered at the recent joint conference of CMS and CMS-Africa people in mission, which took place in Uganda. They are all also representatives for CMS-Africa – dynamic leaders who are real changemakers in many communities. Sarah Holmes met Rachel Karanja from Kenya and asked about how she first got involved in CMS-Africa and her experience as a woman leading a major biogas construction project. Sarah also talked to the Rev Bisoke Balikenga from DR Congo. He oversees the Anglican Church’s youthwork at a national level and also has a passion for peace and reconciliation. Finally, Paul Thaxter, our international mission director talks to a local partner who must remain anonymous but who works in a very sacrificial way in a remote corner of Kenya.

We’re embarking on a world tour around the regions where our people in mission are at work today. Month by month we’ll be travelling to Asia, Africa, Europe and Latin America. We start with Asia: November saw a huge celebration take place in India. In the southern state of Kerala, Christians gathered in their tens of thousands to mark 200 years since the arrival of the first CMS missionaries there. Raj Patel, regional manager for Asia, was representing CMS, along with the Reverend Shemil Mathew who is part of our Asia Forum and himself a modern day missionary sent by the Church of South India to the UK. Raj talks about the celebrations and their deeper meaning. The we talk to Bishop Irfan Jamil of Lahore in Pakistan about the legacy of Sadhu Sundar Singh and CMS's Asia: Prayer and Aware campaign. Finally we talk to Joel Hafvenstein, who has recently taken on the role of executive director of the United Mission to Nepal, of which Church Mission Society is a founder member. He gives us the lowdown on one of

This month we look at one of Church Mission Society’s focus areas – people at risk. We believe God cares deeply about the most vulnerable people in our world, and so do the people we meet this month. First we look back with Laura and Simon Walton over 16 years of faithful work with people at risk in Tanzania, including those living with HIV. Then we meet Becky Reid who has been working alongside Andy and Rose Roberts at the ReVive safe house in Olinda, Brazil. Revive was set up by our mission partners Andy and Rose to provide refuge and restore the lives of girls from the streets who have often suffered abuse of terrible kinds. For our last interview we travel back to Africa and Uganda, where Richard Rukundo, a Church Mission Society local partner, coordinates children’s and youth work for the Anglican Church of Uganda. He has been totally re-engineering children's work and safeguarding in the church there.

We focus our mission lens on Asia, and primarily Nepal. The astonishing growth of the church in Nepal has been well documented. Church Mission Society has got to know several of Nepal’s home-grown mission partners over recent decades and we have been much inspired by them. Our sister society Asia-CMS has a number of partners there including two we’ll meet today. Mark Berry, our community mission facilitator, attended a partners conference in Nepal earlier in the year and met Milan, who serves with the Leadership Training Department of the National Churches Fellowship of Nepal, and Manoj, a longstanding local partner who heads up the Leadership Training Department. He also talks to Ellie May, who took part in our “Mission Experiment” stand at Big Church Day Out last year. One year on and she was just coming to the end of a short term placement which had taken her to Bangalore in India and then to Kathmandu.

Talks from the Church Mission Society Africa conference, held at the Hayes conference centre, Swanwick, 7-9 October 2016. Featured speakers are Dennis Tongoi (pictured), executive director of CMS-Africa, Philip Mounstephen, executive leader of Church Mission Society, and Harvey Kwiyani, executive director of Missio Africanus.

Philip Mounstephen, executive leader of Church Mission Society, leads the first of two Bible studies from the Church Mission Society Africa conference, held at the Hayes conference centre, Swanwick, 7-9 October 2016. Here he focuses on 'breathing in'.

Talks from the Church Mission Society Africa conference, held at the Hayes conference centre, Swanwick, 7-9 October 2016. Featured speakers are Dennis Tongoi (pictured), executive director of CMS-Africa, Philip Mounstephen, executive leader of Church Mission Society, and Harvey Kwiyani, executive director of Missio Africanus.

Dennis Tongoi (pictured), executive director of CMS-Africa, and Harvey Kwiyani, executive director of Missio Africanus, discuss an African perspective on gloabl mission. With Philip Mounstephen, executive leader of Church Mission Society. Recorded at the Church Mission Society Africa conference, held at the Hayes conference centre, Swanwick, 7-9 October 2016. Featured speakers are

Dennis Tongoi (pictured), executive director of CMS-Africa, and Philip Mounstephen, executive leader of Church Mission Society, talk to the Church Mission Society Africa conference, held at the Hayes conference centre, Swanwick, 7-9 October 2016.

How can Church Mission Society come alongside your church and how are we playing our part in growing churches around the world? We hear from the founder of Partnership for Missional Church, an extraordinary initiative CMS has launched nationally in the UK. First we'll hear from Peru and Pakistan, where our people are helping the church grow in discipleship. Featuring: Anna Sims, of Peru diocese's Christian Life and Formation team; Freda, who has spent 30 years working in Pakistan; Pat Keifert, founder of Church Innovations.

We in the UK are well into the summer festival season, which now last from May to September – whatever the weather! This month we're offering you a mini-festival for your ears – a festival of hope. Three of our people in mission tell stories of lives changed as they continue to put their call into action, sharing Jesus in word and deed. Featuring: Sharon Wilcox, working alongside young people with disabilities in Ecuador; David and Liza Cooke reporting on peacemaking and distributing wheelchairs in Kenya's borderlands; Amy and David Roche sharing the story of a truly international journey with Jesus from Lebanon.

This month our occasional series on 'the five marks of mission' continues with the longest of the marks: "To transform unjust structures of society, to challenge violence of every kind and pursue peace and reconciliation". Violence of every kind has been experienced far too often in too many places lately, and not least in Burundi, where mission associate Simon Guillebaud is based with his organisation Great Lakes Outreach. We also meet mission partners in India who are working with those trapped at the bottom by society's unjust structures - including refugee women and people with leprosy. And we hear from mission partner Ed Brice about his work with the Asociana team in northern Argentina, who stand alongside and fight for the rights of indigenous peoples there.

Our theme this month is one of the 'five marks of mission' of the Anglican Communion: to teach, baptise and nurture new believers. We hear about how this is happening from different angles in Argentina, Kenya and across East Africa, as in the Middle East. Featuring: Karobia Njogu of CMS-Africa, who heads up their training programmes. Ed and his wife Marie Brice, whose ministry among women in the Chaco region of northern Argentina is nurturing a steady flow of new believers. And mission partners in the Middle East, working in a sensitive location to support the local church and helping to feed their faith by creating a new Bible translation in a local language.

January traditionally includes the week of prayer for Christian unity, and our programme this month takes that theme. In Brazil, Spain and South East Asia, we'll discover how Christians are learning to work together in very different situations. Featuring: Eluned and Mat Phipps, working across Protestant/Roman Catholic divides in Madrid, Spain. Lizzie Simpson, short termer who worked with Anglicans and Catholics near Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. And anonymous mission partners working ecumenically in South East Asia.

This month continues our occasional series on the five marks for mission of the Anglican Communion. The "mark" we focus on this time is "to respond to human need by loving service" and we'll meet three people doing just that through CMS: Wies Landheer, from the Netherlands, is a CMS mission partner doctor working at Gahini hospital in Rwanda; Ruth Bevan, another doctor, spent six months at the Diospi Suyana mission hospital in Peru as a CMS short termer; and Lendehl Sallidao, a CMS Timothy partner, is a priest in the Philippines and leads Jigsaw Kids Ministries, serving well over 1,000 children at risk in the Metro Manila area every week.