Michele Dove - Wife
Japan has 127 million people but less than 1% is Christian. We minister in Fukuoka city a 2.2 million. Japan is considered an Unreached People group by AGWM
We stay up to date with information from the Joshua Project and from Evangelical/Pentecostal groups based in Ethiopia by which we can see the numbers of languages, ethnic peoples, churches that have been planted by the major Pentecostal groups in country (including the EAG and the Full Gospel Believers Church of Ethiopia), UPGs in Ethiopia and our surrounding neighbors.
River Valley 500. We serve under Dareth & Thida Ly in Siem Reap, Cambodia for 2 years. They have been in Cambodia since the mid-90s working with children and young adults. They help run 3 schools and provide a place (The New Dream Center) for children from the floating village to live who want to continue their education past 6th grade. By living at The New Dream Center, these children are able to attend the junior high and high school across the street and have access to additional English and computer classes through Dareth & Thida’s ministry. They also hold a Sunday church service at The New Dream Center. In the late 70’s, after the Vietnam War, the Khmer Rouge killed roughly a 1/4 of the population of Cambodia. Anyone with a higher education or held a position of leadership were killed. Families were separated and taken to working camps, where they endured extremely long, hard days working in rice fields. Many were killed just to set an example of what would happen if you disobeyed and many others died from the harsh working conditions, long days and lack of food. This event has had a huge impact on the Cambodian people as they continue to deal with the effects of such trauma from PTSD to the lack of knowledge of what a healthy family unit should look like. They deal with a struggling economy, widespread corruption, the highest HIV rate in Asia and some of the highest rates of child sex trafficking in the world. They have prayed that God would use them; that he would reveal His plan for their lives and in February of 2016, He did just that. God has called them to be missionaries to Cambodia. Never in their wildest dreams did they think this is what He would have in store for them. God has given them a calling and theyre simply trying to be obedient servants; vessels to be used by Him to share His glory and truth to the people of Cambodia.
Mark and Janie have served as missionaries in Chiang Mai, northern Thailand, since 1994, where they have been involved in university campus ministry, leadership development, and church planting. Through their “Churches for Churches” program, the Durenes are helping with new church plants in 5 cities, including Teung, where River Valley Church partnered to launch the church. Currently, they are helping to train several other potential church planters, and also serve as mentors to many other pastors throughout the northern Thailand area. In addition, they are the directors of the Global University Thai’s second Bachelor’s program, where they are training current and future Thai ministers. Mark serves as the AGMF Thailand Country Moderator, as well as on several national boards, including Evangelical Fellowship of Thailand (Northern region); Every Home for Christ, Thailand; Thailand AG Northern Region Board of Presbyters; and others. Janie writes Sunday school curriculum for several churches and directs the children’s program at a church in Chiang Mai.
Our mission field covers a vast area. The eleven countries that make up Southern Africa are home to 182 million people, 50% of which are under the age of 18. AGWM currently has approximately 80 missionaries in Southern Africa. Animism is rampant throughout Southern Africa. Animism is regularly mixed in with “Christianity;” creating a form of folk-Christianity that is leading unknowing people to hell. This creates a significant challenge for the advancement of the Gospel because people think they are “Christians” when they are not. Due to inadequate discipleship – many “Christians” continue to pray to their ancestors and visit witchdoctors. As a result, beneath a thin veneer labeled “Christianity”- spiritual darkness and the scourge of lostness remains pervasive throughout Southern Africa. Unreached groups of people are desperately underserved and continuing to wait for the hope of the Gospel to reach them.
Troy and Heidi Jo Darrin seek to minister to the spiritual and physical needs of the people of Moldova. They team up with national pastors in church planting and construction efforts, partner with Convoy of Hope in community outreaches and minister in churches every week, preaching and encouraging the congregations. In addition, Heidi is involved in working against human trafficking—especially that of young women—through prevention awareness and the discipling of young women.
In Luxembourg the Pentecostal movement only has two small churches in two cities and only one of them utilizes the local Luxembourgish language. Of the 0.025% born again believers in the nation, most accepted Christ OUTSIDE the nation and those few often have go to churches in bordering France and Belgium. It is considered social suicide for a Luxemburger to profess Christ. We will be mobilizing church planters who speak Luxembourgish to reach towns and cities such as Ettelbruck, Mersch and Wiltz where there is no church and no known Luxembourger believers. In the Ardennes area of Belgium our partner movement (Franco-Belgian Assemblies of God) only has a handful of churches and most sizable towns have no evangelical church of any kind. We are targeting 30 district towns (including Bastogne, Saint Hubert, Dianne and Bouillon that desperately need a church and church planting teams because there is zero gospel access whatsoever for miles and miles around. In Flanders, the Dutch speaking northern part of Belgium, there are over 7 million people and 40 Pentecostal churches. The average church has 15 members and the averages age of a pastor is 60+. It is a movement on the brink of extinction unless something is done. The Flemish were historically Catholic or Reformed but today less than half of the administrative districts have any evangelical witness at all. The Belgian government recently identified 21 evangelical groups as dangerous cults and has eliminated the religious worker visa category meaning that we are severely restricted in getting missionaries into Belgium legally. This is why we are setting up the planting training hubs as close to the borders of Flanders and the Ardennes to be able to send groups across the borders to establish churches and ministries until they can get non-profit or BAM established to give them a platform to remain in the country.
Their passion and heart is to reach the unreached peoples of their region, planting multiplying churches among them, and to show God’s love to the poor and needy in their city. Its their dream that as people in these communities encounter Jesus, their lives, their families and ultimately their community would be radically transformed. That dream is starting to become reality and they are excited to see it continue to unfold!
Only 1% of French people know and follow Jesus. Many communities have no church and there is a great need to train pastors and plant more churches. The most active faith in the public sphere is Islam, where France has the largest Muslim population in the EU. An interesting stat that shows the need is that there are 40 spiritual mediums for every Christian pastor in France. Most people will never hear the gospel from another believer and the few born again Christians that exist are marginalized.
One in five Gen Z adults now identify as LGBTQ+ while that number for other generations of adults (Boomers, Gen X, even Millennials) has remained the same - showing the impact that the woke media is having on our younger generation. Also, nearly 50% of students are now non-religious, one of the fastest growing demographics on our college campuses. The Secular Student Alliance (actually being promoted by some schools) is a growing organization on our campuses.
Jean coaches worldwide church leaders in Asia, Africa and the U.S.A. on how to conceptualize, plant, cultivate and multiply churches and ministries that are indigenous in nature. She makes sure to do this in ways that are culturally relevant, self-functioning, self-determining, self-supporting, self-propagating and self-giving, and that promote a healthy self-image and a healthy community-image.