Mexico City Missive ~ Summer 2018

All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age. Matthew 28:18-20

Dear friends,

Did you know missionaries receive lots of fan mail? Well, maybe not fan mail, exactly. But we often receive notes of encouragement, holiday cards, and a few inquiries that get us thinking. A few years back, an inquiring mind asked how our ministry focus aligned with God’s purpose. Granted, I may not remember exactly how the sender worded the question, I do remember answering it more or less this way. No matter where Stuart and I are in the world, Jesus’ command to make disciples remains at the center of who we are and what we do.

In Jamaica, making disciples looked like caring for 40 precious children and teenagers at our children’s home. It also looked like teaching at the Assemblies of God Bible College and developing a mentorship program between those two entities.

In Mexico City, making disciples looked like teaching at Anna Sanders Seminary and preaching in our home church and other venues during our first term, and focusing our efforts at Teen Challenge Mexico during our second term.

Suffice it to say, following the call to make disciples has afforded Stuart and I the privilege to love, serve, and minister with many wonderful people in God’s wonderfully diverse world.

Just recently, the Executive Committee of World Missions granted Stuart and I approval for a short-term assignment as Missionaries in Residence (MIR) at Evangel University. This opportunity would not have happened without you. Your support over these last three terms of service (15 years!) gives us the perspective and the experience we need to inspire students in their God-given vocation and help them find their place in his Great Commission. In other words, Stuart and I will continue the process you began in your homes and churches to make educated, responsible, Spirit-led disciples to go and do likewise.

I’ve barely given you a glimpse of all the responsibilities required as a MIR. But as the year progresses, I trust you’ll be impressed with the partnership of Assemblies of God World Missions and our Assemblies of God learning institutions to provide missionary educators to create vision, promote missions, and provide your students guidance as they discover God’s call on their lives.

As I mentioned, the MIR is a short-term assignment (for the 2018-2020 academic years). Then Stuart and I will eagerly return to the field by God’s grace and your continued support. Please know, we need you just as much now as ever. Transitions are never easy. We’ve already hit a few snags that hopefully will turn out to be nothing more than inconveniences. As for now, please pray for us as we settle into a new home and into all our new responsibilities.

Grace and peace,

~ Stuart & Wendy Brown

We met the challenge! A few weeks ago, we challenged our supporters to help us give a generous offering to Teen Challenge Mexico to repair, replace, and upgrade some worn out items at their facility. In fact, you more than met the challenge and so we made these guys, as well as the directors of Reto a la Juventud, very happy. 

Thanks everyone. You're the best!

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Navigating the River together

We loved connecting with Pastor Michael Dubbels and the great people of River of Life Church in Lebanon, Indiana, yesterday.

Stuart shared his testimony and I preached on the compassion and hope of Christ that motivates us to reach out and the Spirit of Pentecost that empowers us to make disciples.

Thank you, River of Life and Pastor Michael for your heartfelt feedback, the great conversation at lunch, and your partnership in sharing the gospel in Mexico City.

Also, big thanks to Follower musician Dean Rebhorn for their award winning New Again CD. Great listening material for the drive home! 

If you would like to partner with us to proclaim release to the captives of drug addiction and to set at liberty those who are oppressed by the sex trade, please consider a one-time gift or recurring monthly commitment. 

Let's make a difference together!

He Gave Them a Cross (Part Two)

He Gave Them a Meal (Part One) He Gave Them the Spirit (Part Three)

Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life. Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. “Never, Lord!” he said. “This shall never happen to you!” Matthew 16.21-22

Why such a fierce response to Jesus’ claim? Sentimentality: Peter could not bear the thought of losing a friend? Messianic expectation: Jesus the true Messiah could not, should not possibly die? Or, as N. T. Wright notes in his book Simply Jesus, because the disciples then (as so many of us today) wanted a kingdom without a cross?

Just moments before in Matthew’s Gospel, Peter confesses Jesus as Messiah. Delighted, Jesus affirms his divinely inspired insight. Yet just as quickly, Jesus rebukes Peter for rejecting the predetermined way of the cross as the means for establishing the kingdom. The ‘son of man’ would not march on Jerusalem to retake it by force as her rightful king. On the contrary, much to the disciples’ surprise (and dismay), the way of the kingdom would be through the cross. And if that was not enough to take in, Jesus sets the way of the cross before his disciples.

Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will save it.

There’s no two ways about it, the cross represented death. Jesus’ ultimatum to his disciples to take up their cross remains for us today an invitation (to put it kindly) to deny selfish means and gains for the sake of the kingdom.

“Somehow,” Wright notes, “Jesus’ death was seen by Jesus himself … as the ultimate means by which God’s kingdom was established. The crucifixion was the shocking answer to the prayer that God’s kingdom would come on earth as in heaven.”

When as his disciples we take up our cross, lay aside our own agendas and follow him we declare daily that God’s kingdom has come, is coming, will come on earth as it is in heaven. The accusation over Jesus’ head, “King of the Jews,” transformed Jesus’ cross into a throne. The disciples did not foresee a suffering Messiah, but that is what they got. And as our King took up his cross so he expects his disciples to do the same. The way of the cross demands everything. And the disciples soon learned that taking up their cross and following him would indeed cost them everything.

Yet here is the clincher – the cross, although a powerful symbol of death also becomes the means to life.

For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it. 

Indeed, to embrace the cross is to accept not only the way of death but also the hope of resurrection. The cross, forever a reminder of how Jesus died also becomes a startling testimony that death could not hold him.

Jesus gave his disciples a meal to explain his impending death. He gave them a cross to express the exacting cost of living for the kingdom. But in just a few weeks time, he will give them the Spirit … stayed tuned.

Matthew 16.13-26. See also Mark 8.27-38; Luke 9.18-26

N. T. Wright, Simply Jesus, Harper Collins: 2011, Kindle Edition