Stories

Leadership Ministries Worldwide recently joined with The Chattanooga Fellows program to provide opportunities for young leaders to gain work experience and discover how their faith informs their vocations.

The Chattanooga Fellows program is one of 19 such programs operating as part of The Fellows Initiative around the United States.  It’s an intensive nine-month program designed to prepare recent college graduates for a lifetime of faithful service as agents of Christ’s redemptive work.  Fellows participate in workplace internships at local businesses and ministries and receive seminary-level theological training while living with a host family in the community.

“We’re given a cultural mandate to work and be stewards and that can be worked out in any vocation, not just missions and evangelism.”          Matt King, Intern

This year, out intern is Matt King.  Matt grew up on the mission field of Papua New Guinea, where his parents supported Bible translation work through mission aviation for more then 16 years.

After graduating from Covenant College in Chattanooga, TN in 2013, Matt worked in the marketplace for a year before joining the fellows program, and has experienced a transformation in his attitude toward work since he began.

“Before I joined the fellows program, I thought you had to be a missionary or a pastor to truly glorify God through work,” says Matt. “The program has really provided me with a much deeper understanding of how to integrate my faith and my vocation.”

Since Matt joined Leadership Ministries Worldwide last August, he has undertaken a variety of projects, including refreshing our website and online store, developing curriculum and materials for the global training network, photographing products, and setting up a shared filing system for our staff.  We’re grateful for the opportunity to participate in the Chattanooga Fellows Program, and we are thankful for Matt and the work he has done!

To learn more about The Fellows Initiative and find a fellows program in your area, visit www.thefellowsinitiative.com. 

An important part of our mission at Leadership Ministries Worldwide is to encourage and equip pastors and leaders around the world by regularly, intentionally lifting them up in prayer.  We are calling for prayer partners around the world who will pray for the direction & protection of thousands or pastors, teachers, and leaders around the world.  We wait to invite you to join us!

The internet has provided a powerful way for believers around the globe to gather in prayer despite tremendous distances.  Imagine a network of believers lifting one another up in prayer: a pastor in Nebraska praying for a fellow minister in Nigeria, or a missionary in the Philippines praying for a Sunday school teacher in Philadelphia.

We need prayer champions to join this network! How can you get started?

• First, visit www.outlinebible.org/pray and join our prayer network!  You’ll receive email notifications when new requests are posted.
• Pray for requests that you find on the Prayer Network, and encourage those that you’re praying for by clicking the I Prayed for This button.
• Post prayer requests for yourself and others.  Do you know pastors, leaders, or missionaries who are working to spread the Gospel in the U.S. or overseas?  Do you need prayer for the work God has called you to do?  Click Share Your Prayer Request to submit your own requests to our moderators.  You may choose to share requests anonymously.
• Regularly check back as we post new prayer requests.

This past April Timothy spoke at a conference in Malawi to more than 700 leaders representing more than 200 denominations. At the end of the conference 250 leaders responded to Timothy’s mission challenge by praying for God to guide them to advance world evangelism from Malawi and to deepen their commitment to biblical preaching.

The following month these same leaders met to pray and strategize about how to achieve their newfound mission. They established a task force to determine how to mobilize their national movement and consulted frequently with Timothy by asking if he would come to “midwife the birth of their movement.”

Out of this group of leaders came 75 who formally challenged Leadership Ministries Worldwide to consider helping them develop a 2 or 3-year program to equip their leaders. A proposal is underway to conduct the first phase of training in April 2015 toward this miracle of God called the Malawi Mission Initiative.

Timothy is appealing to Leadership Ministries Worldwide’s donors, supporters and volunteers to pray and donate resources for the Malawi Mission Initiative. These Christian leaders in Malawi have seen the value of The Preacher’s Outline & Sermon Bible^® and accompanying training that Timothy can provide. Timothy has responded to this divine appointment and now it is Leadership Ministries Worldwide’s opportunity to do the same.

Contact [email protected] to reach Timothy.

This is how one should regard us, as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God.  Moreover it is required of stewards that they be found trustworthy. — 1 Corinthians 4:12

Outlining the Bible helps prepare someone to teach the precepts of Scriptures systematically and in context. The Preacher’s Outline & Sermon Bible^® is designed for the pastor, Bible study leader, or minister to help them examine a text and absorb the complete message of that text.

Outlining the Bible is an invaluable tool for sermon preparation, but it’s a time-consuming approach. Our team of authors has done that work for you, placing verse-by-verse outlines alongside Scripture and compiling in-depth research and commentary. Each passage of Scripture receives almost 200 hours of research work to complete the accompanying commentary.  No wonder each volume of The Preacher’s Outline & Sermon Bible^® contains a year’s worth of sermon material!

Renowned evangelical Protestant scholar Dr. Donald A. Carson is widely credited with the statement that “a text without a context is a pretext for proof text.” This means that when someone interprets anything without examining the context in which it is written, one can easily (or even intentionally) misappropriate, misapply, or misrepresent a text to support a position that it in fact does not support. Outlining a passage is the first step to a thorough study discipline called “exegesis.”

Exegesis helps the student of God’s Word stay true to the original context and enables preachers and ministers of the Word to preach and apply it carefully.  When a thorough exegesis of scripture is done it prevents someone from adding their own prejudices and ideas into the mix and compromising what God is actually saying.  Outline Bible Resources are designed to help you ponder, examine, and expound on God’s Word – not to add in what is not there.

We are proud to announce the newest release of the NIV version of The Preacher’s Outline & Sermon Bible^®: 1st & 2nd Samuel.  With more then 400 pages of notes and commentary, this volume includes both books of Samuel.  As with all NIV volumes of The Preacher’s Outline & Sermon Bible^®, our editorial team spent hundreds of hours carefully reviewing the existing KJV outline and commentary for 1 & 2 Samuel, checking for accuracy and ensuring the outlines follow the NIV scripture translation.

This volume follows the same format and layout our pastors and teachers have come to expect including verse-by-verse outlines; fully developed and researched commentary; sermon points, life application & support scripture; and everything organized at your fingertips in the easy-to-read two-column format for quick reference within each lesson.

Visit OutlineBible.org to learn more and purchase your copy.

The Great Commission compels Christians to go into all the world and minister to all people.  When we consider missions, do we think about prisons as a mission field?  Throughout the Bible, we find many examples of outreach to prisoners.  The apostle Paul spent quite a bit of time in Roman prisons. Christ was crucified between two prisoners.  Psalm 69:33 makes it very clear that “the Lord hears the needy and does not despise His own people who are prisoners.”

According to the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS), there are more then 2.2 mission people currently imprisoned in the United States.  These are men and women created in the image of God, and they need to know and understand the truth of God’s Word.  Prisoners need Christ and must hear and understand His Word to set them free to a life with Christ as they serve behind bars. Prisoners need Bible-based resources and tools to transform and equip other prisoners to share the hope of the Gospel with fellow inmates.

For many years, LMW has sought to equip prisoners and prison chaplains with resources to help them deepen their faith and lead others to Christ.  We regularly recieve letters from prisoners and prison staff requesting The Preacher’s Outline & Sermon Bible® (POSB) and other Outline Bible Resources.  Among the most popular resources requested are the Believer’s Handbook and the four Gospel volumes of the POSB.  Requested materials are sent to prisoners on a first-come, first-serve basis as funds, materials, and manpower are available to fulfill them.  We regularly receive inspiring testimonies from prisoners whose lives have been transformed by God as they serve their sentences.  This excerpt from a recent letter from a prisoner in South Carolina say it all:

“I truly felt and experienced God’s love when I opened the mail. You have no idea what it means to receive a gift, letter, note, communication from a member of God’s body in the Church of Jesus. God’s Love just pours our from your gifts to me.  I in turn will use these books to pour out from the overflow of your generosity and love!

Please send me a cost list for other books.  I pray and ask God to bless me so I may buy Romans, Hebrews, and Ephesians, to begin my library.  I will buy the remaining Bible books as I am able.  Thank you again from my entire heart, soul, mind and body, for your blessing and gift.  The gift has propelled me forward.  Thank you for making a difference and impacting my life!”

Thanks to generous donations of time and money from our volunteers and supporters, we have had the privilege of sending hundreds of Outline Bible Resources to prisons across the country.

Please prayerfully consider supporting LMW as we minister to this important mission field and make a radical impact in the lives of prisoners across the nation.

Visit OutlineBible.org/give today to learn more.