International Mission
The International Mission Resource Team
Growing fruitful followers of Jesus around the world
Our role is to engage Bookham Baptist Church (BBC) members and regular attendees in international mission via the partnership approach. IMRT acts as a bridge between BBC and our international mission partners bringing the two together. We have a catalysing effect, enabling and energising international mission. This is expressed in four ways:
Partners
Sal da Terra Churches, Brazil
In the early nineties, the Sal da Terra churches leadership received a clear vision from God to partner with British churches.
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Sal da Terra operate as a network of churches across Brazil and support a range of local social engagement projects in addition to congregational life.
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Our relationship began in 2000, when a group of Brazilian church leaders were brought to meet church leaders in our local area. At this time, Flavio and Karen Guaratto moved to Cobham and in the years following, various church members and teams came on exchange visits between Brazil and BBC.
In 2010, Bookham Baptist minister Gill Hawkins, husband Phil and their two children moved from Bookham to Brazil to be based at SdT Noventa in Goiania city, staying till 2016. During this time it provided Phil a base to establish the work of his educational charity, “Aprender”, in partnership with SdT‘s charity “Total”. Also, Paulo Junior, the SdT lead pastor, spent several months in Bookham in 2010.
Whilst Gill was involved in preaching and ministry at Noventa, Flavio served on our Ministry Team for a similar period.
We maintain our relationship with SdT churches and at present we are in conversation with SdT Noventa about re-establishing exchange opportunities.
Daniel &Sarah Brito Medeiros, Recife, Brazil
Their call is to work with children and young girls who have been abused or are at risk and with their families and communities, through the love of God to bring healing and transformation.
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Working with the ReVive International children’s home, linked with Church Missionary Society; after a period of lockdown, they are now able to resume helping there. Daniel is studying theology at the Anglican seminary, and is involved in disicpleship. Sarah is a dance and movement therapist, helping in women’s groups, while Daniel is helping raise ReVive’s profile among churches and charities, and working to encourage better understanding among local churches.
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Sarah first went out from Guildford to Brazil in the early 2000’s to work with Happy Child, and met Daniel and married. After nearly a decade in the UK and having a young family, they were supported by BBC to return to Recife to work with a Happy Child safe house. After returning to the UK for a short time, the Medeiros family returned to Recife in 2019; where they work with CMS. They have two children, 12 and 10 who attend a local school and are fluent in Portuguese, and they have bought their own home.
Church of God Life Center, Lebanon
Life Centre Church of God, with the leading of the Holy Spirit, partners with the Body of Christ, seeking to fulfil Christ’s Great Commission to make disciples of all nations, and does so with a generous heart through its humanitarian, educational and social ministry; it also provides a venue for other ethnic churches to run services.
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The Church of God Bourj Hamoud, homed at The Life Centre, enables congregational life through its weekly services and youth work. In addition the team engage in outreach and discipleship work through small groups, Alpha courses and leadership training.
Life Centre has a humanitarian and social ministry, believing God sent them to Bourj Hamoud, putting his passion in their hearts to “Feed the hungry, protect the oppressed, help widows and orphans and support the refugees no matter their colour, background, religion or age.”
For example, they run the ‘Spring of Life’ school providing educational, spiritual and social support for children of refugees, with a food distribution point for some 200-300 families.
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In 2004, Pastor Said Deeb felt a strong call to reach out to the poor in the mainly
Armenian Bourj Hamoud suburb of Beirut, and established the Spring of Life Center, aiming to help street kids. Thanks to wide support from the US and Europe, in 2010 he was able to move to a former church building, and was equipped to support the wave of refugees arising from the Arab Spring in 2011.
Arab Baptist Theological Seminary, Lebanon
ABTS’ vision is to see God glorified, people reconciled, and communities in the Arab world restored through Christ, through offering specialised learning resources and equipping faithful men and women for effective service and witness in their different communities in the Middle East and N. Africa.
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ABTS provide a blended learning programmes leading to a range of outcomes from a certificate in ministry through to various degree/masters graduate courses including the theory of peace-making and conflict resolution in the Arab context.
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ABTS was founded in 1960 in the hills overlooking Beirut. BBC first visited them in 2013 and were impressed by the professionalism and scope of their activities. Later, BBC signed an agreement to provide ongoing support for their work and our teams continue to visit ABTS when in Lebanon. Elie Haddad, President of ABTS, has also visited Bookham.
Pastor Joze and Nada and family - New Life Church, Murska Subota, Slovenia
Joze is a full-time minister with a strong pastoral and evangelistic ministry, while Nada is one of the worship leaders. New Life Church is an evangelical church with an outreach to the community of Murska Subota in the North of Slovinia.
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The majority of outreach is through personal contact with individuals; many are nominally at least Catholic or Lutheran. The Church holds outreach events at Christmas and maximises the opportunity to reach those who attend weddings, funerals and baptisms. In addition to Sunday services, they have a lively Monday morning prayer meeting and a mid-week meeting.
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BBC’s relationship with them started in c1999 when a family on holiday in the area met them. One of their leaders, Bojan visited Bookham a few times and two parties from the church visited for outreach to drug addicts. In 2013 the church had to leave its premises and found new premises in a much more central location which they refurbished and opened in 2014. Groups from BBC visited in April 2018 and June 2019, and Joze and Nada visited us in October 2019.
Aprender
Aprender is an education charity working in inner city neighbourhoods in Brazil, refugee schools in Lebanon and a number of other countries that is passionate about empowering and transforming communities, bringing hope particularly to those who are disadvantaged.
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Aprender formed an education development model that was capable of delivering impact no matter the country, culture or context - Aprender use their model to help organisations set up support schools in developing countries for children that need an extra boost to their studies. In addition they train head teachers in sustainable school improvement to make a positive difference to the futures of children from disadvantaged backgrounds. the model was tested in 2014 when the charity were invited to go to Lebanon and use their model to assist churches serving Syrian refugee children. Following this success Aprender continue their work there in 6 different locations. Their work has expanded and now reaches across the globe including Sierra Leone, Zambia, Nepal, Myanmar, Jamaica, and Malaysia, supporting underserved communities and planting ‘coaches’ locally who are equipped and able to continue development in a self-sustaining way.
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In 2010, Aprender founder Phil Hawkins felt a strong call to tackle the injustices of public education in Brazil, through the development of Education as Mission involving local churches to use education support projects to build bridges into their communities. This happened alongside the developing relationship between BBC and Sal da Terra Church. Phil and family moved to Goiânia in 2010 for 6 years, using this time to conduct research and development about how schools could be helped to sustainably improve life outcomes for their students with limited resources. A strategic relationship was formed with Instituto Total, part of Sal da Terra’s amazing social justice arm.