From Local and National to Global and International

Reading these INCENDIUM articles every week from International Church leaders around the world is FANTASTIC: sound theology, intriguing practice, different geographic regions, various opinions. The kaleidoscope of sources, writers and people starting and strengthening the International Church is very exciting!

I’d like to get personal with this “letter” and recall some MICN history while creating a kind of future trajectory. I’m going borrow the first paragraph from the MICN article written and edited by MICN leadership back in about 2009.

“From the seed of an idea . . . to a community of envisioned leaders”
It was a cold Saskatchewan Canadian winter day in 1994 I received a very warm invitation. TV Thomas recommended me to Leighton Ford Ministries Evangelism/Leadership seminar in balmy Alabama United States. Dr Leighton Ford became a significant mentor as I progressed through several leadership education tracks. Leighton impacted me then and impacts me today. Among numerous lessons learned that have become my ministry DNA are the values of Kingdom versus Empire, empowering leadership versus territorial controlling and association versus denomination. The differences between these three conceptual paradigms were to become the conceptual genesis of MICN.

Kingdom versus Empire because Biblical ministry is owned by God, no one is supposed to possess, dominate or control it. Empowering leadership motivates to equip and release as opposed to Territorial Controlling that manipulates to command and demand. Association is conceptually inclusive and welcoming to all that desire to join whereas Denomination is structurally exclusive and requires outsiders to conform. MICN attempted to adopt and practice Kingdom, Empowering and Association values from the start.

Looking back
MICN is evolving all the time as the diaspora shifts leadership around the globe. Some MICN “originals” that have already graduated and are cheering us on from heaven. Others have moved back to their countries of origin and are still contributing to the International Church movement. I think of Ken HacHarg for example. Ken served as Pastor or interim Pastor of seven International Churches in five countries! He has written at least eight books and still writes regularly on his blog. His latest book describes the International Church history dating back from the Reformation: “From Bangkok to Bishkek, Budapest to Bogota: The Compelling story of International Congregations.”

• Do you know John Calvin was an International Church Pastor?
• Do you know that Vincent van Gogh attended an International Church?
• Do you know that Vladimir Putin’s Russia hosts International Churches?

Presently Debbie and I serve the Martin Luther King (MLK) Eglise here in Paris France. Early in our ministry start here we met returning French expatriates from Abu Dhabi. They committed to Christ at the Evangelical Church that Cam Arenson pastored for over 25 years. Cam was the first IC Pastor from the Middle East to attend an MICN Global Gathering in Jakarta Indonesia in 2004. Cam’s United Arab Emerites discipleship curriculum has been translated from English to French here at MLK and is regularly used to train new believers. The connections in IC ministry come around and around to bless the Body of Christ? We thank God for the IC leaders that have gone before us. They wanted then, like we want today, to simply serve Jesus well in our generation, geographic location and IC calling collecting people from all over the world.

• Are you praying into your legacy?
• What will you leave behind so others can be blessed?
• What do people thank you for as you lead?

I remember starting in the IC in Bandung Indonesia. Our family spent 11 consecutive years growing up together in Southeast Asia. It was amazing! All I ever wanted was for the Bandung International Church (BIC) to “do evangelism in her own backyard.” BIC is now wonderfully renamed “International English Service Bandung” under the very mature and effective leadership of Pastor and Professor Kowalski.

After a couple of years in Bandung I realized Debbie and I were not the standard “macaroni’s” (code word for m….y in this limited access nation) nor were we like Pastors from Brisbane Australia. Instead we were something in-between, a kind of hybrid if you will. We were just lonely and wanted like-minded friends with similar passion to reach the lost. So we started MICN and now we have lots of friends.

Today MICN is so much broader with so many people involved starting and strengthening IC’s. What a thrill it has been to hear the reports of the ReCHARGE gatherings. People is Asia, the America’s and soon to be Europe/ME charged up to go back into IC ministry with their tanks full instead of empty.

Can I tell you about our role now? This Paris calling is another kind of start within MICN.

Why? Because we are inside a HUGE experiment. There is a multitude of national churches around the world in my opinion that need to consider the diaspora more now than ever. The Church is for every tribe, tongue and nation. We have been called to help a national local church become an international global church.

• Reeve’s called to serve as the first on MLK staff from outside France and outside the Assemblies of God.
• Soft English start up services in December 2021 through to April 2022.
• Carefully thought through “INTEGRATION” versus “AUTONOMOUSE” approach. MLK is going bilingual.
• First 100% English Sunday service May 1st and subsequent monthly similar services ever since.
• MLK decides that the entire French staff will learn basic English
• January 2023 Kenya trip that taught us all that English works internationally. 
• The collective decision that Senior Pastor will speak 2X monthly in English beginning April 2023.
• The addition inclusion of Mally McLoughlin as another English Pastor and speaker April 2/23
• We have collectively decided to move to a 100% English service each week from today forward. 

Today April 2^nd MLK will add a 5^th weekend service to accommodate the extraordinary growth we are experiencing shifting from a local national church to an international global church.

I dream of the Church welcoming people from everywhere to into all churches because our world is going global and so must all churches. MICN is in the fast lane aiding the process with our collective contribution toward a more mature global church.

Warren Reeve
MICN Core Values Champion