God created us to thrive when we’re connected with other believers through a local church. That’s why World Impact’s mission is to establish healthy churches through church-based seminaries in every community affected by poverty. Healthy leaders who understand how to study and apply the gospel are crucial to building healthy churches that effectively meet the unique needs of their communities. We’re constantly amazed, but never surprised, at how often God allows our paths to cross with leaders He has prepared to shepherd His people. We’re ready to equip them through our TUMI (The Urban Ministry Institute) Church-Based Seminary program and other training courses.
Mike Dicke, one of World Impact’s North American ministry partners, reflected on this reality during his recent visit to India. He can point to many instances throughout his years of ministry where he just happened to meet the right person in the right place at the right time. These personal, God-ordained connections have led to the establishment of new Church-Based Seminary centers throughout India.
A Story like Ruth’s in the Old Testament
Divine coincidences remind Dicke of the story of Ruth in the Old Testament. After Ruth’s husband died, she chose to stay with her mother-in-law. Although this choice could have been isolating since she left her family, God honored Ruth’s loyalty and faith. One day, while she went out to gather grain behind the harvesters, “as it happened, she found herself working in a field that belonged to Boaz, the relative of her father-in-law, Emilelech.” (Ruth 2:3, NLT). There was a reason she ended up in Boaz’s field: God intended for her to be in the line of David and Christ by marrying Boaz. God put Ruth in the right place, at the right time, to meet the right person to accomplish God’s Sovereign purpose of redeeming His people.
“The words that stopped me were, ‘As it happened,’” Dicke shares. “God was in charge of that, ‘as it happened.’” God establishes the groundwork for what He is doing, long before we recognize the need. In India, God is perfectly timing introductions that lead to new ministry opportunities. God is still orchestrating divine appointments that bring about His redemptive plan.
A Divine Alignment and Encounter for Peter
As it happened, a member of Dicke’s church had grown up in India. He asked Dicke to visit the churches his father and brothers pastored in India. His father had walked in this tribal area 40 years earlier and planted the first church. He believed the pastors would be interested in starting a church-based seminary. The meetings went well, and the pastors and the interpreter loved the curriculum and wanted to get started right away.
As it happened, the interpreter, Philemon was.
Philemon grew up in a Hindu culture. When he was seven, his father lost his mind, unable to even recognize his wife or child. Although the family desperately brought him before every goddess they worshipped, his condition didn’t improve. But when a Christian pastor prayed over him, God restored his sanity. His father gave his life to Christ and returned to his everyday life.
Even after Christ’s spectacular intervention in his father’s illness, Philemon’s family and friends remained Hindu. They concluded that Jesus was merely a god from another caste. Frustrated, Philemon resolved that he would only worship Christ if he, too, experienced a dramatic encounter.
But as it happened, Philemon attended a Christian meeting as a teenager. When he voiced his objections to the leader about Christianity, the leader suggested that God had already intervened directly in Philemon’s life. God healed his father so that he could grow up in a stable home with two loving parents. With this perspective, the Holy Spirit touched Philemon’s heart, leading him to accept Christ. He started attending church with his parents, and shortly afterward, God called him to ministry. Philemon is a graduate of an English-speaking seminary in India.
The Hard-Fought Path to Establishing a Church-Based Seminary
This didn’t go over well with Philemon’s relationships. Villagers, friends, and family members cut off all contact with him and his parents. After five years of brutal isolation, many began to come back around. Philemon and his parents started a ministry in their village. Today, around 35 Hindu families from the village come to church. They also started a ministry among Muslims, with around 10 families from Muslim backgrounds attending the church.
When they established this new church in 2009, Philemon began praying for a way to train pastors from impoverished villages in India. When God led Ps. Dicke to him in 2013 who taught from the Church-Based Seminary curriculum, Philemon immediately recognized it as the answer to his prayers. That seminar opened the door for God’s will to be fulfilled in Philemon’s life by starting the first TUMI center in Telangana, India.
The seminary has since had two graduations, and Philemon is now running two TUMI centers with 35 students.
We Are Thankful for Our Global Relationships
We are thankful for all our global relationships, which allow us to provide TUMI resources to leaders of local churches everywhere. Wherever we go, we witness God orchestrating sovereign encounters, from the mundane to the miraculous, to unite His people for this purpose.
If you’re curious about how to establish healthy churches in all communities through church-based seminaries, reach out! God can use you to reach your community, just as He used Philemon in his community.
We are grateful for your ongoing support. Your prayers and financial partnership are making a difference.
