Bethany is and has always been a church that is outward-focused. We are firmly committed to the Great Commission that Jesus gave to us. We prioritize this global disciple-making in our church by financially and prayerfully supporting multiple missionaries all over the world. The message of the Gospel must get out into all the world. We, however, are not merely a church that has missionaries - we are a missional church, committed to all its people being an active Gospel presence in the daily life. To this end, outreach functions in 4 different ways at Bethany Church:
Mission
Bethany Children’s Ministry seeks to partner with parents as they nurture their children’s spiritual and emotional development. Our primary programming happens on Sunday morning, with age-relevant musical worship and Bible study reinforced by a memorization program.
Various other activities throughout the year reinforce Bible learning and provide fellowship. Bethany Children’s Ministries exists to grow our children in the grace and knowledge of Jesus Christ.
Missions
We have men and women who are financially supported by Bethany to both locally and globally evangelize the lost, plant churches, and train up leaders in all cultures. We also support short-term missions, providing opportunities to raise up future long-term missionaries and provide needed short-term help to those already in the field. You can learn more about them on our Missionaries page.
Equipping We believe that the best outreach will happen by equipping believers to go "OUT" into their communities and share the Gospel. There are classes available in evangelism that we encourage all members to take.
One of the programs we have available is participation in the Global Media Outreach (GMO) ministry. GMO is a ministry of Campus Crusade for Christ. It enables anyone with a computer to be a missionary, with opportunities to contact seekers around the world from your own home. Bethany Church has a team of six online missionaries with Global Media Outreach: Midge Crossan, David Bury, Neal Persons, Kathy Churchwell, Jim Wilday, and John Keirsey.
As Global Media Outreach missionaries, they pray for and correspond with people who have visited one of several websites and where they responded with their email address, an indication of their spiritual state, and a request for contact from a Christian.
At http://www.GreatCommission2020.com, you can see a real-time feed of Global Media Outreach online activity. On a world map you can see a color-coded icon flash each time someone views a GMO site, or indicates a decision to follow Christ, or receives a follow up from a GMO missionary. Our Bethany GMO missionaries are among those who are doing the follow up on that activity. Our team has sent over 1500 email follow ups to over 1000 seekers.
You can go to http://www.globalmediaoutreach.com to learn more about this dynamic ministry. GMO started in 2004. That year, 20,000 people indicated a decision or recommitment for Christ. Last year more than 15 million people responded with a decision to follow Christ. We are praying for 20 million in 2011. Praise God! And if you want more information about our Bethany GMO team, including how to join in, please contact Midge Crossan at paladinprojects.gmail.com.
Social Justice We at Bethany believe that we are not only required to evangelize the lost with words, but also to love a broken world. Jesus proved his great love for the poor, sick, and downtrodden, and we want to follow Jesus' example. We as a church support organizations such as Lifewater, World Vision, and many others to this cause. We also provide many hands-on opportunities for members to serve those in need.
Outreach Events We are a church that seeks the lost; we do not seek to "steal" people from other churches. To this end, we never compete with other churches for better programs. Rather, we do provide the venue for anyone to discover who Jesus is in a variety of social gatherings and cultural events.
Missions Updates - 2-10-13
Missionary of the Week Jerry & Marilyn Hogshead Paraclete Mission Group - USA and India
Jerry left for Bangladesh and India yesterday, Feb. 9. He writes: Please pray for God’s guidance as I explore opportunities for a new project in Dhaka Feb. 11-15; for fruitful training in Biblical storying with our partner in Delhi Feb. 19-21; for insight into leadership training in Hyderabad, Feb. 22-26; for training and coaching with the project team in Bhopal, Feb. 27-March 9; for recovery from a bad cold for Marilyn and for wisdom for her in HOPE’s leadership board; that all will go smoothly for Marilyn and Becca while I am gone. With thanksgiving for your prayers and generous partnership.
Cherie Rempel Christar - USA and Iraq
We’ve added a new winter program to our work in Kurdistan to provide a way for college students to join us on their winter breaks and to expand our Kingdom-building relationships with Kurds. Tawke is the village near DNO, the Norwegian oil company where we’ve been teaching English to their Kurdish employees these last few weeks. Our winter team
leaders, Eldon and Ruth, have done great work in pioneering relationships among the Muslim Bengali men who are sanitation workers here. Praise God for the three who have recently committed to working on our long-term team. Short Term Workers
Simply following Jesus.
Bethany Church of Sierra Madre
93 N. Baldwin Ave. | Sierra Madre, CA 91024 | PH: 626-355-1403
