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N. Carrollton / Plano, TX // F17    Fall 2017
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Note: This class is being hosted jointly at Bent Tree for the first half of the semester and across the street at Prestonwood for the second half of the semester!


You Were MADE FOR MORE!

Use what's in you to bless the world around you!


Perspectives is a 15 week life and learning opportunity that will change the way you view the world around you. In it, you will have your eyes opened to the heart and purpose of God, and how you can take part in His work all over the world, from the urban streets of America to the rain forest and deserts of distant lands. A fantastic array of pastors, theologians, international missiologists and mobilizers will challenge and inspire you with their personal experiences that will open your eyes to see just how big God is, and how much He desires that all might come to know HimWhether you are single, married, a student, a homemaker, a professional or retired, Perspectives will bless and challenge your life and direction. 




Class Info

Date: Tuesday, August 22, 2017

Time: 6:30 PM to 9:30 PM

Location: Prestonwood 6801 W. Park Blvd Plano TX 75093

Contact: Susan Parish

214-636-8070

 
    • Instructor


    • Lesson 1

      The Living God is a Missionary God

      God's purpose is three-fold: against evil—kingdom victory; for the nations—redemption and blessing; and for God—global glory in worship. God's purpose revealed in promise to Abraham. Exploring God's purpose for the nations: Blessing to the nations described.

    • Instructor

      Jon Hardin

      Frontiers, Highlands Ranch CO

      Dr. Jon Hardin is the National Communications Specialist for Frontiers. He has served in full-time missions work for over 25 years. Jon regularly speaks and teaches in churches, conferences, and various training events around the world--he has taught over 35,000 Perspectives students. Jon has a passion for seeing local churches and ordinary Christians step into strategic roles in the global missions enterprise. Jon is an ordained minister, holds a PhD from the VU University in Amsterdam, and did post-graduate studies at the International Baptist Theological Seminary in Prague. He is also a graduate of Denver Seminary. Jon is a CPA and prior to going into full-time ministry he worked for IBM Corporation for nine years.

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    • Class Info

      Date: Tuesday, August 22, 2017

      Time: 6:30 PM to 9:30 PM

    • Lesson 2

      The Story of His Glory

      Exploring God's purpose for Himself: How God has been steadily unfolding a plan throughout all nations and generations to bring about His greater glory, ultimately drawing to Himself the worship of all the peoples. Passion and prayer for God's glory.

    • Instructor

      Vic Anderson

      Dallas Theological Seminary, Mesquite TX

      Dr. Vic's passion is helping others understand and communicate truth found in the Bible. This passion presently is channeled primarily through two organizations - Dallas Seminary and SIM. At the seminary, Vic serves as Department Chairman and Professor of Pastoral Ministries, teaching courses related to Spiritual Life and Preaching. With SIM, he continues his work in cross-cultural theological education, focusing primarily on developing church leaders for East Africa, especially Ethiopia. He helped establish a Bible College in Addis Ababa in the 1990's, and now, having finished 15 years of full time missionary service, he returns each summer to Ethiopia to teach for a couple of months. Vic has been teaching with Perspectives since 2007, and he finds great personal inspiration in the Story of God's Glory. He anticipates that students in every Perspectives class will be stunned as they are gripped by the Master's mission for His world.

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    • Class Info

      Date: Tuesday, August 29, 2017

      Time: 6:30 PM to 9:30 PM

    • Lesson 3

      Your Kingdom Come

      Exploring God's purpose regarding evil: How God has accomplished a defeat of evil powers in order to open a season of history in which the nations can freely follow Christ. The kingdom of God as the destiny of all history. Christ's mission seeks a hindering of evil to bring about a sign of the coming peace of the kingdom of God. Our prayers contend with evil in order to bring about the transformation of society with Christ's kingdom in view.

    • Instructor

      Phillip Nelson

      SIM, Charlotte NC

      Rev. Dr. Phillip Nelson pastored for over thirty years. He has served as a mission mobilizer for over ten years and, in addition, began teaching Perspective classes 25 years ago. He is the husband of one wife and father of five saved adult children. He is a preacher and teacher of the Gospel for 45+ years.

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    • Class Info

      Date: Tuesday, September 5, 2017

      Time: 6:30 PM to 9:30 PM

    • Lesson 4

      Mandate for the Nations

      Jesus shows great strategic interest in Gentiles; wise strategic focus by initiating a global mission on a few disciples among the Hebrew people. The Great Commission and the ways of God's sending in relational power. Dealing with the ideas of pluralism (all religions the same) and universalism (all persons saved).

    • Instructor

      Todd Ahrend

      The Traveling Team, Fayetteville AR

      Todd Ahrend graduated from Northeastern State University, has a Masters from Dallas Theological Seminary and a Doctorate from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary. He is the founder and international Director of The Traveling Team, a national missions mobilization movement. He and his wife, Jessica, have spent almost two decades traveling both nation-wide and abroad, speaking to thousands of people about involvement in world evangelization. Todd has exposure in over sixty countries and has lived in the Middle East. He is the author of The Abrahamic Revolution and In This Generation. Todd and Jessica have six children: Camden, Brody, Axel, Noble, Quincy and Cruz!

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    • Class Info

      Date: Tuesday, September 12, 2017

      Time: 6:30 PM to 9:30 PM

    • Lesson 5

      Unleashing the Gospel

      The first followers of Jesus: obedient in costly, foundational ways. The climactic act of the book of Acts is the freeing of the gospel to be followed by Gentiles without Jewish traditions as a requirement. A foundational act of God which speaks to the situations where the gospel is hindered today. Strategic suffering and apostolic passion.

    • Instructor

      Darrell MacLearn

      Kindred Communities Organic Church Network, Goodyear AZ

      Darrell MacLearn is a fourth generation Nazarene Pastor now serving as the assistant conference superintendent in Arizona with the Free Methodist. He holds a Master of Arts Degree in Theology from George Fox University Seminary and has served as a pastor since 1994. The last several years he’s been a missionary in America where he has been planting the church amongst unreached people groups. Darrell launched and served as the director of the Nazarene Organic Church Network and was a consultant for the Nazarene Denomination. He also works with New Church Specialties as a National Coach and Consultant for church health and church planting.

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    • Class Info

      Date: Tuesday, September 19, 2017

      Time: 6:30 PM to 9:30 PM

    • Lesson 6

      The Expansion of the Christian Movement

      The story of God's purpose continues relentlessly from Abraham's day until the present moment. An overview of the largest and the longest-running movement ever in history—the world Christian movement. How the gospel surged through the peoples and places of the world. Important insights for our own day.

    • Instructor

      Ally S.

      Carrollton TX

      Ally has served the Perspectives Movement in various roles from coordinator to instructor, for the past eleven years in Texas, where she lives with her husband and two boys. Her passion for the nations has been the driving force throughout her Christian walk, taking her into the inner cities of England, the mountains of the Afghanistan and India and the refugee camps of Pakistan, and now the suburbs of North Texas.

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    • Class Info

      Date: Tuesday, September 26, 2017

      Time: 6:30 PM to 9:30 PM

    • Lesson 7

      Eras of Mission History

      The greatest explosion of growth ever has taken place in last 200 years in three "bursts" of activity. Why we could be in the final era of missions. The global harvest force comprised increasingly of non-Western missionaries.

    • Instructor

      Jeff Kwon

      Frontier Ventures, Frisco TX

      Jeff has been married for 31 fantastic years to Allyson and they have 3 wonderful children Garrett, Julie and Lisa. He is passionate about seeing all believers involved in the expansion of God's Kingdom especially when it involves getting the Good News to the unreached and unevangelized. He has just joined Frontier Ventures as the Director of Recruitment, and previously served for 17 years as: The Director of Human Resources, Director of Recruitment, and Home Office Director for Beyond (Formerly Mission to Unreached Peoples). Prior to being in vocational ministry Jeff was a clinical pharmacist for 18 years in Los Angeles, CA.

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    • Class Info

      Date: Tuesday, October 3, 2017

      Time: 6:30 PM to 9:30 PM

    • Lesson 8

      Pioneers of the World Christian Movement

      Today we anchor the race by continuing what others have begun. It's a day of finishing. All the more reason to learn the wisdom and the heart of ordinary people who did extraordinary things in earlier generations. Reading the writings of William Carey and other leaders to discern what these people have left to us. Exploring the contribution of women in missions throughout the centuries.

    • Instructor

      Courtney Contos

      Cafe 1040, Inc., Cleburne TX

      Courtney Contos received a history degree from Texas Tech University, and then worked in a health club as a personal trainer before switching to full-time work in mobilization. From 2007-2010 she lived on the road with The Traveling Team, casting missions vision to college-age audiences around the U.S. That was followed by three years with Cafe 1040, an Atlanta-based group with intensive missional training bases in Africa and Southeast Asia. She currently resides in Cleburne, Tx with her husband where she spent most of her growing-up years.

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    • Class Info

      Date: Tuesday, October 10, 2017

      Time: 6:30 PM to 9:30 PM

    • Lesson 9

      The Task Remaining

      God's pressed His purpose forward until the present hour of amazing opportunity. Understanding the concept of "unreached peoples" to assess the remaining task. Recognizing the imbalance of mission resources shapes strategic priorities. The basic minimal missiological achievement in every people group opens the way for working with God against every kind of evil so that the gospel of the kingdom is declared and displayed with clarity and power. The need and opportunity of urban mission.

    • Instructor

      Justin Long

      Beyond, Garland TX

      Justin Long is a global missions researcher. He presently serves with ActBeyond as part of the Global Ephesus Initiative which seeks to send teams to start movements that cascade through whole People Clusters. As a researcher He maintains the Global District Survey (places to go), Movement Index, Movement Case Study archive, compiles People Cluster Forecasts, and edits The Long View weekly missions trends analysis. His website is http://www.justinlong.org.

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    • Class Info

      Date: Tuesday, October 17, 2017

      Time: 6:30 PM to 9:30 PM

    • Lesson 10

      How Shall They Hear?

      Culture and intercultural communication of the gospel. Communicating the gospel with relevance at the worldview level helps avoid syncretism (blending of cultural error with God?s truth) and also enables powerful movements of the gospel. Sensitive missionaries will look for ways that God has preserved or prepared people to hear the gospel, often finding redemptive analogies for God's truth.

    • Instructor

      Sunny Hong

      Wycliffe Bible Translators, Dallas TX

      Born in South Korea, Sunny Hong came to the US in 1983. She was employed in the computer software profession and was active in a local church. At that time Sunny was seeking for God’s call as to how she could be involved in missions. Eventually she felt God’s calling to the ministry of Wycliffe Bible translators. She joined Wycliffe in 1994 and worked as a mobilizer for Koreans in the US and Canada for 12 years. She then was sent to the Philippines to work as a mobilization consultant for the Wycliffe Asia and Pacific areas. While in the Philippines, she sensed God redirecting her ministry to missiology/anthropology. She pursued an intercultural studies Ph.D. program at Biola and after completing these studies, started working as a senior intercultural consultant at SIL International which includes teaching at Dallas International University, in Dallas, TX.

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    • Class Info

      Date: Tuesday, October 24, 2017

      Time: 6:30 PM to 9:30 PM

    • Lesson 11

      Building Bridges of Love

      The incarnation as a model of missionary humility. How missionaries can enter appropriate roles in order to form relationships of trust and respect to develop a sense of belonging, and thus to communicate with credibility for understanding. Explore the intricacy of identification in another culture. Explore the even greater complexity of presenting identity with integrity in a globalized, terrorized, pluralized world. Recognizing the dynamics of social structure in order to initiate growing movements of ongoing communication throughout the society.

    • Instructor

      Robin Harris

      International Council of Ethnodoxologists (ICE), Dallas TX

      Dr. Robin Harris is the director of Dallas International University's Center for Excellence in World Arts (www.diu.edu/arts) and also serves as the president of the International Council of Ethnodoxologists (ICE). She co-edited "Worship and Mission for the Global Church: An Ethnodoxology Handbook" (William Carey Library, 2013) and speaks widely on the topic of arts and cross-cultural service.

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    • Class Info

      Date: Tuesday, October 31, 2017

      Time: 6:30 PM to 9:30 PM

    • Lesson 12

      Christian Community Development

      A survey of world need. Dynamic balance of evangelism and social action. Hope for significant transformation as a sign of Christ's Lordship by Christian community development. Exploring the charge that missionaries destroy instead of serve cultures. Healing the wounds of the world between the peoples.

    • Instructor

      Jimmy Dorrell

      Texas Christian Community Development Network, Waco TX

      Jimmy & Janet Dorrell moved into an low-income neighborhood in Waco, TX, in 1978, and founded and is now president emeritus of Mission Waco, a large urban Christian community development organization with 16 programs and 80 staff, with work among the addicted, unemployed, homeless, sick, illiterate and unchurched. In 1992, The Dorrells planted Church Under the Bridge in 1992 as an outdoor church meeting under the Interstate 35 and S. 4th Street underpass (currently meeting at the Magnolia Silos until Summer 2022). As pastor, the church now has 275 very diverse attendees. Dorrell also founded the statewide Texas Christian Community Development Network. As an adjunct professor at Truett Theological Seminary and Baylor, he teaches Christian community development, missions, and community engagement classes. Dorrell has written four books, including "Commonwealth: Transformation through Christian Community Development;" "Dead Church Walking," "Trolls and Truth" and "Plunge2Poverty." The couple, married 43 years, also continue to work in Haiti, India, and MxCity. They have four children (one deceased) and 10 grandchildren.

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    • Class Info

      Date: Tuesday, November 7, 2017

      Time: 6:30 PM to 9:30 PM

    • Lesson 13

      The Spontaneous Multiplication of Churches

      Look beyond institutional features of churches to understand churches as dynamic movements of Christ Himself being followed. Such a view of churches as organic, living things opens up the practicality of seeing them multiply rapidly as movements and also flourish in society bearing the fruit of social transformation. Churches as counter-communities, acting as salt and light, bringing change to their cultures. How movements multiply by connecting with entire families and larger social structures.

    • Instructor

      Brian

      Frankston TX

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    • Class Info

      Date: Tuesday, November 14, 2017

      Time: 6:30 PM to 9:30 PM

    • Lesson 14

      Pioneer Church Planting

      The hope of planting churches among unreached peoples. How the breakthrough of the gospel in an unreached people requires that the gospel be "de-Westernized". The difference of contextualizing the message, the messenger and the movement. Distinguish and appreciate people movements, church planting movements and insider movements.

    • Instructor

      Doug Schaible

      Ethnos360, Wichita KS

      Doug & Cheryl Schaible were church planters among the Solong people of Papua New Guinea from 1991- 1998. They were able to see believers raised up as a result of learning the language and culture, building relationships and teaching and translating the Scriptures in the native language.

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    • Class Info

      Date: Tuesday, November 28, 2017

      Time: 6:30 PM to 9:30 PM

    • Lesson 15

      World Christian Discipleship

      What it means to integrate life for Christ's global purpose as a "'World Christian". Into the great story for His glory: a Person-driven life as a way of. pursuing a purpose-driven life. The basic practices of world Christians: going, sending, welcoming and mobilizing. The essential disciplines of World Christian discipleship: community, giving, praying and learning. Simplifying your lifestyle as if in "war-time". Exploring the practical ways of pursuing God's purpose. Business and mission. Short-term mission. Welcoming international visitors. Wisdom in working with local churches and in partnership with Christians in different parts of the world.

    • Instructor

      Bryan Padgett

      Redeemer Stillwater, Stillwater OK

      Bryan has served in mission mobilization for over 10 years with ministries such as The Traveling Team, Perspectives on the World Christian Movement, Frontiers, Avant and more recently as missions pastor at Redeemer Church in Lubbock, TX. He and his wife are currently planting a church in Stillwater, OK. They hope to plant a church that would intentionally develop and send many church planting teams out among unreached and unengaged people groups. If there was one verse that drives what he does, it would Habakkuk 2:14 which states, "For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as water cover the seas." He is married to Abbey and has four kids - Judson, Lydia, Isobel and Hazel.

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    • Class Info

      Date: Tuesday, December 5, 2017

      Time: 6:30 PM to 9:25 PM

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