Growing Trees in Mongolia

Thanks for joining us for GO Week 2024! This week, we welcome special guests, Mark and Cinda Wood, who have been serving as aXcess international workers serving in Mongolia for 16 years. Mark digs into Psalm 1 and answers the question, “How do you grow a network of healthy churches in Mongolia?” 

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Thank you. "Move to Cleveland for the weather," they said. Well, good morning, Grays. Good morning, Grays family online. Those of you who are joining us around the world, it is great to be with you this morning.

Buktrei senbatskono sahnam rskatsno. Did you rest well? That's how we greet everyone in Mongolian. And then, if you're going to see them in the evening and they're going off, you say, "please rest well."

I want to start this morning with a question, and it is this: What does it take to raise up a network of healthy churches in Mongolia? We are a part, as Jonathan said, of the Christian Missionary Alliance. And our goal, we, Cindy and I, serve under alliance missions in a structure called Access. Our goal is to raise up a healthy network of churches in other cultures so that those places may be able to build up congregations like this one here and then send out people to other places around the world so that those people can also hear the good news of Jesus Christ.

Let me introduce you to my family. These are our children: Annika, our daughter, graduated from Wheaton College last year. She's currently in the Chicagoland area. And our son Toby is currently a sophomore at Wheaton College. When we went to Mongolia, our children were ages three and seven. We were praying that Toby would be potty trained, and he finally was. So that was a great thanks.

Here's a more recent picture of us. We were very thankful last week to be able to spend some time, spring break, together. When we got on the plane in Mongolia two weeks ago, it was 35 below zero. They don't do windchill. So again, when I said move to Cleveland because of the weather, I wasn't kidding. So it was nice to have some tastes of home this morning.

When I look throughout scripture, one of the things that I pick up on is a metaphor for the growth of the church that alludes to a tree or a forest. We're going to see it in Psalm chapter one that we're going to look at in a moment. We see it throughout the New Testament as Jesus talking about the parable of the soils. We also see, for instance, Paul talks about it in 1 Corinthians when he's talking about the church, and he says, "I planted the seed, Apollos watered, but the Lord God made it grow."

Oftentimes, when I think about what we're doing in Mongolia, I go back to that metaphor of planting trees, and I say that we're there to plant trees. We want to see a forest that is built up over time, that as people are growing down into the roots of Jesus Christ, that that church will endure for centuries forward.

This is a picture that I took in Mongolia. What do you notice about trees? Not very many of them. Our experience in Mongolia is you estimate how long it takes you, then multiply times two, and you kind of get an estimate of what it's going to be. But our desire again is to see a healthy network of churches.

As you look at this map, this shows where people around the world have access to the good news of Jesus Christ. Think about it for a moment. If you wanted to hear, or someone around you wanted to hear the good news, how long would it take for them to be able to access it? Probably on your cell phone. We talked about Easter's coming up, handing out invitations, readily accessible. But for the areas in the red, that is where people have no access to the good news.

Our structure is called access, and the reason for that is because we want to see gospel access for and from all people. And one of the things that's exciting for us is that 80% of our workers are engaged in this window where people have the least access or no access to the gospel of Jesus Christ.

What does this look like in reality when we send out workers and to see this network of churches grow up? Let me share with you for a little bit about the Philippines. In 1899, the Christian Missionary Alliance sent out workers to the Philippines. At that time, there were no churches of the CMA that were established there. In 1947, two years after the end of World War II, there were 13 Filipino churches, and they established Comocop, the Christian and Missionary Alliance Church of the Philippines. Today in the Philippines, there are over 500,000 members, over 3,000 churches. Because someone went and planted the seed.

But the most exciting part for us is that Cindy and I serve today in Mongolia alongside Richelle and Melody Marad, who are sent out by the Philippines to serve in Mongolia. That's what we call Missions 360, of places in which we have sent people are now returning that fruit, going on to other places so they may also hear the good news of Jesus Christ.

As we talk about Mongolia today, I want you to remember that Mongolia is not just a place, but it is about a people. When I pray for Mongolia, this man is who comes to mind. He's a man I met on the train, and I think about the things that he has seen in his life. You can see from his features, he spent many hours outside. But when I see him, this is what I imagine for Mongolia.

Why Mongolia? It is a country that in many ways is considered the least: 3.5 million people. The size is about twice the size of Texas, the size of Alaska. Not very many paved roads. But it's a very strategic country. To the north is China, or sorry, to the north is Russia. To the south is China. And Mongolia is positioned strategically in that place. Mongolians don't need passports to go into many countries where people with U.S. passports are not able to go.

1990, Mongolia opened up. From about 1924 until 1990, Mongolia was considered one of the least reached countries in the world. There were only four known believers at that time, all outside of Mongolia. And so, from 1990, when this country that opened up, suddenly there is a rush as the church is being built up. And we are seeing today over 45,000 people who are saying, "I am a follower of Jesus Christ." We praise God that he is bringing about that harvest.

I'm gonna ask you this morning to please turn in your Bible or on your device to Psalm chapter one. It's also appearing there on the screen. Would you please stand with me as I read this passage, and may God open your heart and ears to it. Let's hear God's word to us this morning.

Psalm chapter one: "Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked or stand in the way that sinners take or sit in the company of mockers, but whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and who meditates on his law day and night. That person is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither—whatever they do prospers. Not so the wicked; they are like chaff that the wind blows away. Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the assembly of the righteous. For the Lord watches over the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked leads to destruction."

Amen, this is God's word. Please be seated.

There are many reasons why I chose this passage, as we were talking earlier about this concept, this image that we see again here in Psalm one. It is the idea of different elements working together to bring about health. It's an ecosystem. Just as Paul is talking about this process of planting a seed and watering, we also see it here in Psalm one, particularly in verse three.

This psalm stands as a signpost, I guess if you will, that you are about to enter into the land of the Psalms. And it is saying there are two very clear ways to go. Number one is the way of the Lord that leads to abundance, that leads to fruit, but then the other, starting in verse four, the way of the wicked. In verse six, it says it leads to destruction, but sandwiched right in here, not by accident, in the central verse three, the focus of this passage is that a person who follows the way of the Lord is like a tree planted by streams of living water, which yields its fruit in season.

I believe that the image that the author is bringing about here is of a word that doesn't actually appear in the psalm, but we see it throughout the Old Testament, and it is the concept of shalom. Shalom is often interpreted as peace, but it has a larger meaning, which means flourishing. And it is this idea of a tree not just doing okay, not just eking out an existence like a poorly fed house plant, but of just an abundance of fruit, the most healthy, beautiful tree that you have ever seen. That is our goal, and that is our prayer in Mongolia, a place that is often very dry.

And in fact, when you think about this, Psalm one, written in the midst of the Middle East, the abundance in streams of living water is not a natural image that comes to mind. It is one that requires imagination. But yet, I believe that one of the most important disciplines in Christian ministry is gospel-driven imagination. It is the ability to see things not just as they are, but as they can be, as they are transformed through the power of Jesus Christ.

When we look at our lives, when we look at the lives of those around us, it is not where I am today, but it is who Jesus is at work in my life. When we look around at our cities, in our countries, places like Mongolia, it is to say, no, not just how it is now, but what is God doing to bring about this harvest of righteousness?

So, I was talking to a senior member of our leadership. He says, you know, when I have looked at what the Christian and Missionary Alliance and Alliance Missions has done, when I look at the places where it has been most fruitful, there have kind of been three components that have consistently been at work. And those three components are theological education, leadership development, developing leaders, quality materials translated into the heart language of the people, and the third is church planting. Those are the three components that, kind of like to build up this tree planted next to streams of living water. That is what we want to see.

Let's look at the first component, theological education and leadership development. This is the primary ministry that Cindy and I are involved in. We lead an NGO called Kingdom Leadership Training Center. This is our logo. When you look at this logo, what do you notice? What is at the center? A cross. And that is because all our training is Christ-centered. It is focused on the person of Jesus. The Bible is the primary text. The primary text that we are leading our students through to engage with what God's Word says.

But if you also notice the design around it, that is distinctly Mongolian. That represents a Mongolian knot work or a Mongolian ger door. You might know the term yurt, which is a traditional Mongolian tent where they live. But it is the idea that we want to be Christ-centered but also contextually appropriate.

The key verse that we have for our school is Psalm chapter one, verses three. That we pray, and our goal is that our students, and please pray for us, would be like a tree planted next to streams of water, that would yield its fruit in season, and its leaf would not wither.

What is a host? Well, this is a picture of what a host is. It's actually a grove of aspen trees. And so, this is a beautiful image of the body of Christ because some of you may know, some of you might not know, that the world's largest organism is actually an aspen grove. And one of the things that's very unique about aspen trees is that even though they are separate trees above ground, underneath ground, they are all connected by the same root system. Isn't that a beautiful portrait of the body of Christ, that this morning, people around the world, in their various locations, have been joining together and worshiping the name of Jesus, but we are all connected throughout this world, throughout time, through the person of Jesus Christ? It's a beautiful image that God gave us for the school.

Our school has three different levels of certificate, diploma, and then bachelor's. It takes six years to progressively go through that program. We're fully accredited through Asian Theological Association. Our people coming into our school have to be involved, active in a local church before they can actually enter our school. It is not a discipleship training school because discipleship is the job of the local church, and we do not want to do that, so then people will send people to us to disciple, but we are training leaders.

So, this was a year ago, our largest graduating class to date of 14 bachelor graduates and 14 certificate graduates. Please pray for them as they are serving the Lord in Mongolia and beyond, that they would be like trees planted next to streams of living water.

I want you to pray in particular for two Mongolian people that I want to introduce you to, and this is Toya & Ngana. Toya, who is in the purple, she serves as our Dean of Students, and there are so many things that she does, and that we depend on her. Cindy and I work very closely with both Ngana and Toya. Ngana is the local church pastor and also a faculty member at our school, and so please pray for Ngana and Toya and the critical ministry that they work with, as well as leading the local church and Kingdom Leadership Training Center in Mongolia.

The second thing that is very important in Mongolia that he is using to bring about a harvest of righteousness is quality Christian resources of translation and publication. If we were to gather all the books right now in the Mongolian language, Christian kind of resources or subjects, we'd probably have about 120, 100 books in Mongolian. How many of you have more than 100 books on your cell phone or device right now that you have access to? Okay, most of you, the majority. That's one of the things why it's a critical need. They call it the theological famine.

And so, this to date, we've published eight books. This is Old Testament and New Testament made simple, with many of our faculty members, that we want to get into the hands of local church leaders. We often don't give away things for free. The reason for that is if it's free, it's perceived as having no value. And so we want to make it, though, accessible for as many as possible who need it.

We're very excited that one of the other books that we recently translated that was published in December was A.W. Tozer's "The Pursuit of God." This is already having a significant impact. We want to also have some of A.B. Simpson's that we can help people understand what is it that we're about as part of Alliance World Fellowship, as part of the Christian and Missionary Alliance.

Another key resource that we translated two years ago that's having a significant impact in bearing fruit is "Soul Care" by Dr. Rob Riemer. Many Mongolians have a lot of wounds and traumas and things that are unprocessed in their background that can lead to sinful behavior as they have been sinned against. And soul care is a process of inner healing that they are able to walk through. That time and again, as we have seen people set free and delivered through reading this book, it has been an amazing, amazing process.

The final thing that we are involved with, and one of the greatest needs that we have, is church planting. I want to introduce you to the president of the Mongolian Alliance Churches. This is Bat and Hungra, and they actually were in the video that you just saw earlier. They were elected about a year ago at a meeting of all the Alliance Churches that came together. Would you please pray for Bat and Hungra that God would give them wisdom, would give them a voice, would give them unity as they lead our churches and also help in planting other churches so that we would see other congregations built up throughout Mongolia.

The next picture is going to give you an idea of this is the gathering of all our churches together. We fit in one room. My hope is that comes the day when we're not able to fit in one room because there is multiplication that has been taking place, and we look forward to that day. But please pray for these churches that they would grow in health, that they would grow in a passion for Jesus Christ, and that they would be able to multiply.

We are also involved in several other things in Mongolia. One of the critical needs that is present is people who are battling alcoholism. Celebrate Recovery has been a very valuable ministry for that. It's estimated that around 25% of Mongolian men, and I think that's actually quite low, struggle with alcohol addiction in some way.

We also, as part of that, have a critical prison ministry in which we have a team. Ghana, who I introduced earlier, is there with the guitar, but also in the white post, right next to me, is Munkinshigai. His name is Golden Anklebone. Mongolians, their names are just—they have tremendous, powerful names like warrior and steel and iron and flint, and my name, Mark, in Mongolian means postage stamp. So, I'm okay with that. Some people have even shared this morning that, you know, God sends you, you're willing to stick with it, you go anywhere, and I'll take that, but I kinda, you know, warrior sometimes sounds like a pretty good name that I take, but we're very thankful for that ministry.

In that particular prison, prisoners go down to the well each day, fill up water to have running water for that prison, and our goal is that we would like to help bring water into that prison, and God continues to open doors for ministry.

Another thing that God is doing is through peacemaking. We teach peacemaking at three different levels of teaching people how to be reconciled to one another and make peace through the gospel of Jesus Christ. This again has just been a phenomenal desire that people have that say, "please come, talk to me about this, I want to make peace."

Please pray for Cindy and I because we often find ourselves in the midst of negotiating peace between two parties, but it's such a beautiful thing to bring people back and to be reconciled and back into fellowship. Praise God for what he is doing through that.

Cindy's gonna share some of the ways in which you can partner with us in praying for Mongolia. Also, want to invite you out to the Feast of Nations Monday and Tuesday and prayer meeting on Wednesday. We have a lot more that we would love to share about Mongolia, and we love hearing your stories.

Mongolia, I don't know what comes to mind when you think about it, but you may think like, wow, that really is the ends of the earth. We joke, "It's not the ends of the earth, but you can't