New Christian Leadership in India Emerge From Marketplace

(MNN)

More and more people are coming to know Jesus Christ through marketplace missions, contemporary primary means of sharing the Gospel.

In India, Christian ministries are facing a number of challenges. It's becoming increasingly impossible for foreign ministries to provide monetary support for ministries in the country.

To beat the odds, Christian leadership has started utilizing Indian marketplace to fund mission frontline in India.

Global Advance, an NGO that supports frontline leaders, has mastered the method of using marketplace to worship God and open opportunities to tell others about him.

"There may come a day where it's almost impossible to get money into closed access nations and that's why it is so strategic to raise up godly kingdom marketplace leaders who will be the ones that are not only called to be salt and light, but from a practical standpoint, they're going to be the ones that are going to financially fund kingdom work within their own nations," said Jonathan Shibley of Global Advance.

Global Advance has successfully worked with this strategy for the past 14 years. The organization has helped native leaders to see that providing monetary support to ministries is a form of worship to God.

Marketplace leaders see "that their work is a form of worship to God, that God can use them in the marketplace through whatever realm of business or activity that they're in to be salt and light in the nation and in a nation like India where some of the states are really cracking down on proselytizing," Shibley added, according to Mission Network News.

In a country like India, where there are numerous hurdles for ministries from the government, setting up native leadership is vital.

The centrality of this strategy involves contextualizing—the Gospel given in a context that meets people where they are.

Global Advance draws parallels between Jesus' disciples and us today. The disciples were ordinary, working men who God called to serve him in evangelism. He called them to be fishers of men, and he calls all of us to do the same today.

"People are still open to the Gospel in the sense that everyone is wired the same way, globally. Everyone cares about their family, their future, and their finances. So if we can fish with the correct bait, people will be always drawn to the message and the hope of Christ."

Shibley has suggested interested people to start with prayer:

"Number one, ask yourself, 'what is my occupation and how could God use me today wherever I am for his glory?' And then thinking globally about missions, maybe in a new way, ... pray that God would send workers into the harvest field, and maybe part of that harvest field is also the marketplace around the world."