Swing the Sword: Inside GSI's High-Risk Mission Work

GSI stands out as "the Navy SEALs of the mission world," going where it's hardest to reach with the gospel and facing daily persecution and risk to share God's word with unreached people groups in closed countries.

• Growing up in missionary families versus discovering missions as adults
• Learning multiple languages to effectively share the gospel
• The challenge of reaching people in places entirely hostile to Christianity
• Why language acquisition is critical—knowing 70% isn't enough
• The extensive training and preparation needed before field deployment
• Experiencing the privilege of sharing Christ with people who've never heard
• Presenting the Bible chronologically creates powerful "aha" moments
• A Central Asian church plant that grew to 55-60 believers
• How businesspeople can support missionaries running platform businesses
• The story of Lina, who was thrown out of her home for following Jesus
• Churches should maintain direct involvement rather than just "pay, pray, and get out of the way"
• Why missions in closed countries requires supernatural intervention

The task remaining includes over 7,000 unreached people groups. Whether you go, send, pray, fund, welcome, or mobilize – everyone can play a vital role in fulfilling the Great Commission.

Follow @unreachedpodcast on Instagram for more!

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:05):
In Revelation 7, john shares his vision of heaven
with members from every tribe,tongue, people and language
standing in the throne roombefore the Lamb.
Yet today there are still over7,000 unreached people groups
around the world.
For the last six years, myfamily and friends have been on
a journey to find, vet and fundthe task remaining.

(00:28):
Come journey with us to theends of the earth as we share
the supernatural stories of Godat work through the men and
women he has called to reach theunreached.
Hello friends, welcome back tothe Unreached Podcast.
Dustin Elliott here, your hosttoday, and we are wrapping up
our summer series, as promised,with the three main mission

(00:50):
partners of Bless.
We have featured Ethnos360 andSteve the CEO.
We have featured Pioneers andSteve and Nathan, ceo and Chief
Admin Officer, and now we haveour third and final of our main
partners.
This is GSI.
We have Sean and Jay with ustoday.
Sean and Jay are both on theinternational leadership team as

(01:12):
well as the church relationsteam for GSI.
I'm going to start out by justsaying there's a phrase that's
often used when talking aboutGSI, just for context for you,
the listeners so a lot ofunreached people groups have an
open front door right.
The country is perfectlywilling to have Christians come

(01:34):
in and bring business and bringthe gospel and plant churches,
but a lot of places don't havean open front door.
As you know, a lot of countriesand the leadership of those
countries are against it.
They're trying to run thingsand keep the power and control
for themselves, and so you haveto find kind of another way to
get in.
And so GSI is affectionatelyknown as kind of the Navy SEALs

(02:00):
of the mission world.
These guys tend to go where it'shardest to get to and most
dangerous and most risky.
And I was joking with the guysbefore because I was like do
y'all even like that comparison?
Maybe the Navy SEALs are theGSI of the military.
Maybe we flip it around, thepoint being you go where it's

(02:20):
hard to go, you work where it'stough to work.
Persecution and risk iseveryday part of your lives, and
so for the listeners, just know, a lot of what you're going to
hear today is very secure.
So you're going to hearpseudonyms, you're going to hear
stories, but they're not goingto be necessarily the exact

(02:40):
people or exact locations,because we have to protect those
folks and we are fired up tohave these guys on today.
So, sean and Jay, welcome tothe show.

Speaker 2 (02:48):
Yeah, it's a real privilege to be here, dustin,
thank you.
Thank you very much for havingus.

Speaker 1 (02:52):
Okay, absolutely, that's Jay Jay.
Why don't you give us a littlebackground on you and then Sean
will get a little background onyou and kind of catch us up to
speed?
How'd you get to know the Lord,how'd you get involved in
missions and how'd you get kindof where you are today?

Speaker 2 (03:06):
Yeah, so I actually grew up in an Ethnos 360 family
down in Bolivia, south America,so my parents and grandparents
were part of that organizationfor many, many years.
Wonderful, and that's how Icame to know the Lord.
I actually grew up in a tribalgroup out in the Amazon jungle,
so that was where I came in andcame to an awareness of the need
of unreached people groups.

(03:26):
And then, as my wife and I gotmarried and moved out, we
decided that we would go andwork in a close country, and so
we went out with GSI to acountry in Central Asia and
worked with a people group therefor about 13, 14 years on the
field before coming back to theUS.

Speaker 1 (03:42):
Wow, okay, so you speak four languages, and then
one of the four is the tribewhere you grew up, right?

Speaker 2 (03:49):
And actually one of the four is the tribe, where we
worked overseas.

Speaker 1 (03:51):
Okay.
We spoke Spanish where I grewup, got it Okay, all right.
Well, we had, you know, steve,with Ethnos on and he talked
about how they served in SouthAmerica, but the tribe they were
in wasn't even aware that thenation they were in spoke
Spanish.
So, you know, can't bepresumptuous and understand
who's speaking what.
And, sean, give us yourbackground please, sir.

Speaker 4 (04:12):
Unlike Jay, I jokingly say that I speak one
language American so I didn'tgrow up with the same
cross-cultural experience thatJay did.
In fact, I grew up in anon-Christian family, wrenching
on hot rods and riding HarleyDavidsons, and I actually came

(04:32):
to know the Lord when agirlfriend of mine took me down
to Waco, Texas, as a part of heryouth group and I met a
homeless guy who looked likeBilly Gibbons from ZZ Top.
He shared the gospel with meand the Lord transformed my
heart and gave me eyes to seethe goodness of who Jesus was
and what He'd done to die for meon the cross.
And so really after that, Ididn't have any interest in

(04:53):
missions at that point, butstumbled upon a guy who was
recruiting people to give theirlives to going overseas, and I
began to see God's heart for thenations in the Scriptures and
decided I wanted to give therest of my life to that.

Speaker 1 (05:06):
Wow, that's fascinating.
Let me go back to Jay realquick.
So how did you meet your wife?
Was that internationally or howdid that happen, so we actually
met?

Speaker 2 (05:16):
in college Both of us were attending NC State
University and a mutual friendintroduced us, specifically
because she had interest ingoing overseas and was actually
trying to become a missionarynurse, and so a friend of mine,
knowing that that was mylong-term goal as well was, like
you have to meet this guy therecan't be that many of these
kind of people in the world andintroduced us and we headed off

(05:37):
and a few years later we weremarried.

Speaker 1 (05:39):
Okay, awesome.
And Sean, did you meet yourlady at Sturgis on a Harley
Davidson, or how did y'all meet?
It was not at Sturgis though itseems like it should have been.

Speaker 4 (05:50):
No, I ended up rather marrying a pastor's daughter
and, yeah, married into aministry family and met her in a
church membership class of allplaces.
All right, yes, of all placesAll right, and she walked in and
I spotted her from across theroom when she walked in the door
and told my best friend, whowas there with me, I'm going to
go talk to her and the rest ishistory.

Speaker 1 (06:12):
You know we laugh with the singles ministries and
the young adults ministries atchurch and this concept of kind
of you catch what you fish for,right.
You know you meet a girl at themembership class at a church
that might be somebody that youwant to align to.
You know, meet a girl out onthe town at a bar.
You know, maybe not the samevalues, right?
So you know, pay attention towhere you're fishing.

Speaker 4 (06:34):
Right, what pond are you throwing your line in
Exactly?

Speaker 1 (06:37):
Exactly.
All right, jay.
So back to you.
Why don't you take us throughkind of you met your wife, you
get married, you know you wantto go into a closed country, so
take us through that process.
How'd you get linked up?
Let's do this.
How'd you get linked up withGSI right?
So for somebody listening thatthinks they want to go into the
field, they're getting to meetsome different great sending

(06:59):
organizations through thispodcast kind of series here.
How'd that happen for you?

Speaker 2 (07:03):
So I don't know how many of your listeners are aware
of the relationship betweenEthnos 360 and GSI, but there's
a long mutual history there.
Gsi actually came out of beingthe branch of Ethnos 360 that
was targeting specificallyclosed countries, and so when we
went to the training at thetime it was still all one
organization and so we hadpresentations from all of the

(07:25):
different fields would come tous in the training and kind of
try to recruit us to their field.
And I recall very distinctlythat there were people there
from the country of over heardabout this and were, you know,
so motivated to hear the storythat they were telling that they

(07:48):
had actually walked for days toget into this area and and
brought a letter to thesemissionaries saying you know, we
hear that you're telling thesepeople God's talk, who's going
to come and tell it to us?
And so this, this recruiter wasthere with that letter.
Um, in our training center mywife and I just looked at each
other like maybe we should goand tell them.
And then a person from the fieldof Mozambique came and was

(08:10):
telling a story about how theyhad a people group there that
called themselves the forgottenof God, and he was saying who
wants to go tell them thatthey're not forgotten by God?
And so just story after storyfrom these fields of all the
huge needs and how could you notbe motivated by that?
One of our people that came tothe training while we were there
was actually from a field inCentral Asia and told a story of

(08:31):
how his family had beenprivileged to be part of a
church plant there and how theywere looking at a people group
nearby.
And as he talked and describedthe people group and the needs
there, just both my wife and Ilooked at each other and we're
like, yeah, that's got to be forus, and it was immediately

(08:51):
apparent to us that that's wherethe Lord was taking us.
And so we began our journeythat ended up taking us there to
Central Asia, learning thenational language there for a
few years and then eventuallymoving out to learn the minority
language of this unreachedlanguage group in Central Asia.

Speaker 1 (09:01):
So you went in, knowing this is what you wanted
to do, but not knowing where youwanted to go.
You were open-handed, you knowyou were pitched to um shark
tank style here here, go here,go here.

Speaker 2 (09:14):
Here's a letter, here's a, here's a need.
Yeah, it's a great privilege tobe in a place like that.
I mean you, just you can't, youcan't underestimate the, the
power of the Holy spirit himself, when you get to hear the needs
laid out before you and you'vealready committed to this task.
But you're just saying, Lord, Iwant to go where you want me.
Where is that?
And praying over each and everyoption.
And it's very heartbreakingbecause in many ways, you want
to clone yourself 10 differenttimes and go 10 different places

(09:36):
, and so it's challenging to beon that end where you're like
okay, I can only pick one ofthese 10 options and I've got to
just make a choice.

Speaker 1 (09:44):
Yeah, I mean, I think a lot of the listeners can
relate to that, because I thinka lot of our hearts get
dislocated to use a Chip Ingramterm from his book but a lot of
our hearts get dislocated fordifferent ministries and
different nonprofits anddifferent people groups and we
want to support them all but theresources are only what they
are.
So what year about was this?

(10:04):
When you decided?
When y'all went to the field,you said you were there 13 years
.
So was this like mid-2000s?

Speaker 2 (10:11):
2005, we went into training.
In 2006, we went overseas.
Do you have family?
Yeah, I have a wife and twochildren.
We have two sons.
One was born right before wewent to the field, so he was
like six months old, I think,when we got there, and then the
other one was born a first yearon the field.

Speaker 1 (10:25):
Okay, so your kids then knew knew life more in the
field than they knew lifestateside right.

Speaker 2 (10:32):
Oh, absolutely they.
They are 100% kids from fromthat part of the world.
They they still think ofthemselves being from that part
of the world and, and eventhough they're in college now,
it's like exploring a brand newculture.

Speaker 1 (10:46):
Man, we were on Zoom the other night with some
missionaries that we support andthey were laughing.
They were just talking aboutthe things they didn't expect,
right?
And one of the things theydidn't expect was that their
kids, who were born there andgrew up there, like the cuisine,
the food in Southeast Asia istheir comfort food, it's what
they love.
And they're back in Americaright now on respite and their

(11:09):
daughter keeps saying like Iwant this to eat and we don't
have it the same here, butthat's her comfort food.
And the other point that shemade was everyone here speaks
English.
Everyone here speaks the samelanguage and I understand it,
but where she's used to being,there's different dialects and
different languages and she'snot used to being able to
understand everybody.

Speaker 2 (11:29):
Yeah, we have sitting on our counter right now.
We have some cookies that wewent and bought at the
international market.
Just because my boys were intown and they were, they had a
hankering for these cookies thatI don't enjoy at all, but they
grew up eating, you know, forthe time they were two, so you
know they're very used to themand that's for them, like he
said, their comfort food.

Speaker 1 (11:46):
Wow how about that, Sean?
Let's come back to you.
So what's it like for you withmanaging both church
relationships who are, you know,the local church being the
critical component in sending amissionary and supporting a
missionary and praying for amissionary, and then they're
going to partner with you.
So you're managing thoserelationships, but then you're

(12:07):
also managing the other side, ifyou will, of the kind of
barbell approach.
Talk about just that.
You know, being in the middleof those relationships.

Speaker 4 (12:17):
Yeah, if I could rewind the tape just a little
bit in terms of you asking Jayhow he got exposed to GSI and
how he came to know about thatorganization, my experience
being a little different thanhim, mostly in the US, in
recruitment and mobilization.
I had formerly worked for anorganization that partnered with
probably 40 of the largestsending agencies in America,

(12:42):
which gave me a real peek behindthe curtain of what those
agencies were doing, where theywere working, what their church
planning methodologies were and,to go back to the Navy SEALs
illustration at the beginning,where we started their training,
specifically what those majoragencies were doing in terms of
training.
And so for me I came to learnabout GSI really through sort of

(13:05):
my college roommate whocurrently serves overseas with
Ethnos and their church plantingright now in the middle of
translation work, and I was soimpressed by Ethnos' pre-field
training that I was starting tolook around in the missions
world for other organizationsthat were expecting that kind of
pre-field training but thatwere also handing the authority

(13:29):
to send workers back to thelocal church.
And so, to answer your question, kind of one of my roles as a
part of the church relationsteam and recruitment
mobilization is to really helpthe church understand that the
authority to send belongs tothem and the pre-field training
and the process of seeing themplant a church over a period of

(13:53):
15 to 20 years, that reallybelongs to them.
But an agency in many ways, isthere to help along the way.
So part of my job is to reallyeducate the church to say this
is your authority to send, butwe're here to help along the way
.
So part of my job is to reallyeducate the church to say this
is your authority to send, butwe're here to help resource you

(14:13):
with things like orthographiesand, for our listeners who don't
know that, that's the processof having to try to create an
alphabet among a language groupthat doesn't have a written
language, that they're going toneed it in order to be taught
all that Jesus commanded.
So all those intricacies ofphonetics, phonemics, phonics,
orthographies, running abusiness, and so what really

(14:35):
impressed me about GSI over theyears of hearing about them from
different organizations and themissions world that I was
living in was really, again,just the pre-field training that
they required, the long-termfocus that they had to see a
church planted and then themhanding the authority back to
the local church to send.
So, again, my job is to reallyhelp the church understand that

(14:57):
it's their authority to send andwe're here to help resource
them.

Speaker 1 (15:00):
Yeah, I think that if you haven't heard of all the
podcast episodes we've done,then you may not have heard this
before, but you probably don'trealize how many people groups
out there don't have a writtenlanguage.
And so you go in, you learn thetrade language, kind of the
majority language of the area,where the different tribes with
different dialects kind of cancome together and trade

(15:52):
no-transcript, and theneventually, once you've taught
them to read and write, you'vetranslated some scripture and
now you're going into thattranslation where you're still
working very much with thepeople in the tribe or in the
people group that are involvedin that process as well.
Right, correct?

Speaker 4 (16:13):
And again I mean there are some technicalities to
what Jay has done and what GSIis focused on.
So, as somebody who's inrecruitment and mobilization in
some ways, my job is to try tohelp simplify those
technicalities so that you know,the mom who's staying at home

(16:34):
changing diapers and doingdishes can understand what the
mission of God is and what it'sgoing to take to see churches
planted among these unreachedlanguage groups.
So it's, how do we take thosetechnical concepts and make them
transferable to the localchurch so that the whole church
can be involved in the work ofsending, so that the whole
church can understand what isthe task that their workers is

(16:58):
focused on?
And you even elaborated on someof those technicalities, dustin
, in terms of the trade language, the minority language and many
other things that we could talkabout.

Speaker 1 (17:07):
Yeah, and Jay, you can probably speak to this, but
we've learned through the 50 orso episodes we've done on the
podcast.
Now we always talk about andthe Bible's translated to
English as the heart, the heartposture, a softened heart
replacing the heart, but somepeople, groups, think of the
stomach, some think of the liver, some groups don't have a word

(17:31):
for grace or love or some of themost important words that you
need to effectively convey theposture of God and the posture
of Jesus and the whole kind ofthe point of the story right,
saved by grace, through faith.
And so what did you encounter,jay, or what have you
encountered in terms of thenuance of different languages

(17:52):
and how you work through that?

Speaker 2 (17:55):
So this is actually a challenging thing, dustin, for
a lot of monolingual people toreally understand.
I think that the people thatspeak one language have a
concept that linguistics is abinary option Either you speak a
language fluently or you don't,that it's zero or one.
And the truth is that languagelearning, just like many other
things, is a spectrum where youstart at zero, and a person who

(18:18):
has spoken that language sincebirth might be at 100.
And you have to recognize, assomeone who's moving into a
country in adulthood, you'renever going to reach 100.
So the question then becomeswhat level do you need to reach
in order to explain verychallenging worldview-level
concepts to someone from adifferent culture?

(18:38):
And so, do I need to get to 80?
Is it okay if I get to 70?
You know where?
At that point am I able to sayokay, now I can talk to you
about the Word of God, because Ithink many people travel to
other countries and it's veryeasy to do Duolingo for a little
while.
Or, you know, even study in auniversity there for six months
and get to the point where youcan go to the market and you can

(19:00):
say give me two kilograms oftomatoes.
Or you can tell the bus driveryou know, hey, stop at the next
corner.
But that is a massive gapbetween that level of language
and the ability to say JesusChrist is the propitiation for
your sins and then explain whatthat means.
And so when you are learning anew language, you are working

(19:22):
into that level.
And I actually think that one ofthe biggest problems we have in
missions today is a lack ofaccountability in language
levels.
I've often joked with peoplethat you could solve many of the
problems in world missions ifevery church that sent out a
missionary required thatmissionary to get a language
check in the level that they are, you know, to see what level
they speak, the language they'reministering in.

(19:43):
And then the pastor heard arecording of someone speaking
English at that level.
Because I think we think, oh,you know, someone is over there
and they send me back a reportthat says hey, I've been
studying for a year and I justgot a report that says I'm, you
know, progressing high Well as apastor or as a supporter.
How are you supposed toevaluate what that means?
You don't have any concept, nothaving learned a language

(20:05):
yourself.
It's like great, you know, gopreach the gospel.
You know, go plant churches,and it's actually very, very
challenging to learn a languageto that level.
It requires most.
For most people, it requires acouple of years of study, and so
for us, we spent two yearslearning the national language
in the capital city.
Then we moved out to thisremote village area.
Now we have to running abusiness while we're there,

(20:28):
because now we can't have a visafrom a university anymore, and
so now we're running a businessfull-time while we're also
studying this language.
That took four years in ourcase before we reached the level
that we could actually preachthe gospel.

Speaker 4 (20:40):
Just to simplify it, jay, to your point.
One of the things that I'mtrying to do when I'm teaching
at church is when we're talkingabout what percentage of
proficiency is enough, I'lloften throw up something like
John 3.16 on the screen, a versethat everybody knows, and I'll
say, hey, listen, let's say thatyou only knew 70% of John 3.16.

(21:02):
Which 70% are you willing tokeep and which 70 percent are
you willing to punt on?
So the 30 percent that youdon't know, is that the word God
that you're willing to give up?
Is that the word forgivenessthat you're willing to give up
To your point, dustin?
Is that the word love, whichmay not even exist in the

(21:24):
context, the cultural context orlinguistic context that you're
in?
And at that moment it's like,oh, I thought, by knowing 70
percent, that was a C, but a Cis enough for you to totally
misunderstand the 30 percentthat's most important in John

(21:44):
3.16, and that's where the ahamoment takes place of.
This is why language andlanguage consulting and language
checks is so important forgospel ministry.

Speaker 1 (21:54):
Yeah, clint and I are both nodding at each other.
The light just went off for ustoo, and you know Clint's a
worship pastor and I just thinkof, like, try writing a worship
song where you can only use 70%of the words, although a lot of
people sing where you can'tunderstand 30% of the words
anyway.
All right, moving on, moving on.

(22:16):
So I think, if I'm a listenerand I'm hearing this, one thing
that I'm starting to understandabout GSI is a real, true
commitment to excellence.
You really want to develop yourpeople to a place where they
can convey the gospel clearlyand effectively, and I know

(22:38):
several missionaries that we'veinterviewed, even on the podcast
, have said that the people foryears have been begging them
essentially to tell them thegood news.
Tell us the good news, tell uswhy you're here.
And they have to say I can'ttell you yet.
I can't tell you yet.
I have to get to the placewhere I can fully have that

(22:59):
conversation, I can field yourquestions and I can effectively
present the gospel to where itwill be clear.
Is that right?

Speaker 2 (23:10):
Yeah, I think in many of our cases where GSI works,
because we're in closedcountries, we're not,
unfortunately, seeing very manypeople that are saying please
tell me, you know, you're goinginto areas where everybody is a
Muslim, everybody is a Buddhist,everybody's a Hindu.
You know, whatever language,whatever worldview they have,
they're very content with thatworldview.
They have no, they see no needto change it and they actually

(23:31):
are actively opposed to changingit.
And this is one of the thingsthat makes world work in closed
countries so challenging,because you're going into a
place where, kind of all theforces are aligned against you.
The government does not wantyou to be there doing what
you're doing.
The people themselves do notwant to hear the message that
you're bringing, and so you'vegot all these extra challenges

(23:53):
on top of all the challenges ofyou know just being in a place
that isn't yours, learning a newlanguage and a culture.
You know communicating thegospel, planting a church,
raising up elders, doing allthese kinds of things.
Now you've added in thisexternal hostility towards what
you're trying to do, which iswhy I often say that I believe

(24:13):
that the task of plantingchurches in unreached language
groups is actually the mostchallenging job in the world,
and I don't say that like kindof facetiously or ingesting.
I mean that literally.
I think it's harder than brainsurgery.
I think it's harder than youknow literally anything AI,
research, anything you couldthink of.
That would be the most complexand challenging task in the
world today.
I think that this particulartask that we're talking about is

(24:33):
more so, and I actually believethat there's a great freedom
once you understand that thistask is not doable by a human
person, is not doable by a humanperson.
No doubt I actually think it'sone of the greatest beauties in
the world is to be a part ofmissions, because missions is
where we get to see what God isdoing in the world and not what
we're doing in the world.
And I think that's such abeautiful picture when we can

(24:56):
say, hey, I'm going to go dosomething that actually cannot
be done by a human person.
I have a picture that I show tochurches of this Valley in a
central Asian Muslim country andit's one of our workers was
doing a survey of thisparticular people group and he
got to the top of this, thismountain pass and he looks down
and there's this Valley and it'slike 800 people live in this

(25:18):
Valley and they speak a totallydifferent language than he does.
Um, he's just spent three yearslearning the national language
and now he's here, you know,trying to reach this particular
people group, and you just lookat it.
You think everyone in thatvalley would probably kill you
if they knew why you were there.
And I've got to, you know, gothere, learn this very
challenging language.
And then I've got to move intothat valley and learn another

(25:40):
language and I've got to runsome sort of business and I've
got to come up with some sort ofreason for them to just let me
live among them.
I've got to have some sort ofbusiness that I've got to be
operating.
I'm going to be minus 30degrees outside in the winter.
I'm going to be heating myhouse with coal, I'm going to be
hauling water from the well.
I've got all these massivechallenges.

(26:01):
And then to realize that, ontop of all that, no one actually
wants me here, no one wants tohear the gospel, and it can feel
very demoralizing, very likeGod, why have you brought me to
this place and asked me to beinvolved in this ministry?
And I actually think that'swhere God is telling us hey,
this is what it means to stepout of the boat.

(26:23):
You know, we see over and overand over in Scripture that God
chooses broken, flawed, limitedpeople to accomplish things that
only he can accomplish.
And the reason why he choosesthose broken, flawed, limited
people is because he gets theglory when that happens.
Right, no one would have beenimpressed with God if Israel

(26:44):
also had some giant guy thatwent down and took out Goliath.
They would have been impressedwith God if Israel also had some
giant guy that went down andtook out Goliath, they would
have been impressed with thatguy.
Why does God choose, you know,the teenage shepherd boy who
can't even wear armor?
Because when that guy kills agiant, you know David tells us
it's so that all the world willknow that there's a God in
Israel.
It's like that's why Godchooses these broken and flawed

(27:05):
and limited people, because whenhe does something through us,
it's something that none of uscan take credit for.
When you get to stand amongpeople that are worshiping the
God of the Bible, from a peoplegroup that just years before
were intensely hostile to that,there's a privilege to that.
That's like nothing else in theworld.
You realize I got to step outof the, the boat and I got to

(27:26):
walk on water.
And when we come back and wetell these stories, you know to
people like you guys that arelike I didn't get to be a part
of that.
I didn't, you know, tell mewhat it's like.
The point of the story is notman.
Look at that guy, he's a NavySEAL.
He's really cool.
The point of the story is I gotto be a part of something that
only God could do.
Let's get excited about thatand that's kind of what fires me

(27:48):
up about being involved inmissions is that all of the
church is invited into thatplace where we get to be a part
of God doing something that onlyhe can do, that we can't do.

Speaker 4 (27:57):
I would add to that that it's not only something
that humans can't do, but whatdrives me and motivates me is
it's fail-proof.
I mean, revelation 7-9 tells usthat this is going to happen,
and so even for the missionaries, who might not be a part of
seeing the church plantcompleted, you know, I'm

(28:19):
reminded of Jesus's words inJohn, chapter 4, to the
disciples.
He says you know, you reap offof what someone else sowed.
The harvest that you're takingis off the work of the prophets
that came before you.
And so not only is it a taskthat humans can't do by
themselves, but the end is sure,like we get to see the end of

(28:41):
the story.
So there's hope in the fight,there's hope in the battle,
there's hope in the suffering,to know, at the end of the day,
like it's fail-proof.

Speaker 1 (28:52):
I don't know that.
That would qualify as thegreatest recruitment speech of
all time, but it's a heck of ahalftime speech.
It's a heck of a halftimespeech, right, they're all
against us.
And the thing is and I thinkthe listeners know this you and
God make a majority in everysituation.
You're looking at that 800people and you're not alone

(29:17):
there.
And you're not alone therebecause of that triple-braided
cord, ecclesiastes, right, andyou're there with a team most
likely, right, there's more thanone of you there and you're not
going to accomplish it all.
And we say this a lot like whenyou get an at-bat.
One of the guys in my D group,you know, he was just talking
about how the pool guy came overand he had a cross necklace and

(29:39):
they started talking and what'sthat about?
And he prayed with the guybrought, invited him to church
and get, you know, guys out ofin and out of jail and all these
different things are happening.
And I said, man, I'm just proudof you for taking a swing Like
you got in that bat.
You took a swing, you took aswing and you are a key step in
his journey, right.
So God worked through you inthat moment.
And when you put yourself in theposition that Jay is in and

(30:02):
others are in, you're puttingyourself in a position where
you're going to get swings everyday Not that we all don't we
all do, we can always bring upJesus in any conversation but
you're putting yourself in aposition where you're going to
get more swings.
And then you're also in aposition, if you're in the field
, in a place that's closed likethis, where you're constantly

(30:23):
relying on God, constantlyrelying on Him to protect you,
to guide your path, to orderyour steps, right, you're there
at peace because that's wherehe's called you to be and that's
where he is using you.
I mean, even look at, kind of,how we set up the intro and
outro of the podcast, right.
These are the stories of God atwork through the men and women

(30:45):
he's called to reach theunreached.
This is not the stories of menand women at work on their own
right.

Speaker 2 (30:52):
That's exactly right, dustin, and I appreciate the
analogy of swinging.
I often talk about peopleswinging their sword and I
actually think this is one ofthe areas where missions can be
a real inspiration in this areafor those of us that don't go
overseas.
So if you're here in the US andyou're listening to these
stories about, you knowincredible things that God is

(31:12):
doing overseas.
I hope that what that inspiresyou to do is get out and swing
your sword where you are,because I think I used to come
back from the field all the timeand you know you come back
every four years and go to yourchurch and and it's you know you
could just immediately see whowas swinging their sword and who
was not.
Because the people that areswinging their sword, you know
it's like soldiers in a battleI'm just imagining, like in

(31:33):
world war II.
You know a gathering ofsoldiers.
You know somewhere in a safecountry where you know one guy
has been working, you knowfighting against the Nazis in
Germany and another one has beenfighting against Japan, and
even though that's not my battle, they're fighting in a hill.
That's not my hill and they'refighting a different enemy.
It's like I'm interested toknow how the war is going over
there.
What lessons are you learning,what things are you seeing and

(31:55):
how's it going?
Because when I finish my battleover here, we might have to
come over there and join youguys.
And so there's this mutual likehey, we're all swinging our
swords and so when I would comeback, I would immediately be
able to see who was engaged inthe battle in their hill,
because they would be interestedin the battle in my hill.
They'd be like, hey, tell meabout.
You know what's life like overthere in Central Asia?
What's going on with thoseChong people?
You told me to pray for a guywhose name starts with A.

(32:18):
I've been lifting him up beforethe Lord every day.
You know what's his full name.
I want to write it down so Ican pray for him.
And then immediately I want tohear about you know, hey, I know
you guys adopted a specialneeds child two years ago.
You know how's that going?
I know it's been reallychallenging.
Like, walk me through it.
I want to hear about how it'sgoing Because I think there's
this mutual like interest thatsoldiers have in the battle.

(32:39):
It's just, but you can tell thatwhen there's a guy whose sword
is just leaning up against thebarracks wall and he's playing
video games in the barracks.
Like the enemy is notinterested in that guy.
It's not, he's not a threat andso he doesn't really care about
the battle, anybody's battle,whether it's on the hill next to
him or the hill a thousandmiles away, and so it's.
I think the missions have thisunique way of drawing us into
this where it's like like, ohman, you know, I'm hearing about

(33:02):
the battle in a more clear way.
It's like you're going upagainst the forces of evil in a
way that's really perceptive tome and then that awakens me to
oh man, I've got to do that samebattle every day where I am.

Speaker 1 (33:13):
By the way, I just want the listeners to hear me
say this when we have Light theWorld and we bring you guys over
from overseas all to Austin andwe do a big night of worship
and Christmas and celebrationand we raise money and support
the work, when you see thesemissionaries who've never met
each other, when you see themget in the green room, the way

(33:35):
you interact with each other isawesome.
It's like two MVPs of a leaguemeeting each other.
And you see, I'm going to use avery slang term here, but game
recognize game.
Right, you see it.
You see each other, you have anappreciation for each other,
respect for each other, yourblood, sweat and tears out on

(33:56):
the battlefield together.
And you're going to have togive me a second here.
You're getting me on a soapboxbecause you said you kept saying
swing the sword, swing thesword.
Now, the concept of a sword isthroughout the Bible, right?
You see it all the way back inGenesis, in the Garden of Eden,
and then Ephesians 6.
If the listeners, if you're notspending a little more time in

(34:19):
Ephesians 6, but the whole armorof God, I want to read this
because the sword is not just ametaphorical weapon.
Okay, so let me read Ephesians6, and then I'm going to come
back to the guys and talk aboutwhat is the sword right?
So from 10 to 18, a final wordbe strong in the Lord and in his
mighty power.

(34:40):
Put on all of God's armor sothat you will be able to stand
firm against all strategies ofthe devil.
For we are not fighting againstflesh and blood enemies, but
against evil rulers andauthorities of the unseen world,
against mighty powers in thisdark world and against evil
spirits in the heavenly places.
Therefore, put on every pieceof God's armor so you will be
able to resist the enemy in thetime of evil.

(35:01):
Then, after the battle, youwill be able to resist the enemy
in the time of evil.
Then, after the battle, youwill be standing firm.
Stand your ground, putting onthe belt of truth and the body
armor of God's righteousness Forshoes.
Put on the peace that comesfrom the good news so that you
will be fully prepared.
In addition to all of these,hold up the shield of faith to

(35:21):
stop the fiery arrows of thedevil.
Put on salvation as your helmet.
And here we go.
Take the sword of the Spirit,which is the Word of God.
Pray in the Spirit at all times, on every occasion.
Stay alert and be persistent inyour prayers for all believers
everywhere.
What is your sword?

(35:42):
Your sword is the word of God.
So if you're not in your Bibledaily, if you're not memorizing
scripture and committing it tomemory of your brain and your
heart, then when you're on thebattlefield and you reach for
your sword, are your words goingto be the Word of God or are

(36:04):
they going to be related to theWord of God?
Are you going to speak thatlanguage in that language group
at an 80 or a 90 and trulyconvey it clearly?
Or are you going to know 70% ofwhat the Bible says and kind of
maybe move the needle, but notreally?

Speaker 4 (36:20):
You know, dustin, to Jay's point.
You know in so many ways thebattle is mutually informing.
I think that oftentimes whenlocal churches start to catch a
vision to see the nation's reachfor the gospel, there's
sometimes confused members whofear that if we focus our
attention on these unreachedlanguage groups, then what about

(36:42):
the needs right here?
And so those sort of becomein-house debates among churches.
But I think the reality of whatJay's talking about, with the
battle being mutually informingbetween you know us being on the
German front, and you being on,you know, the Japanese front,
is that what I've seen inmobilization and recruitment is
that as local churches get avision to see the nations

(37:04):
reached, that mutual informinglifts the morale and the courage
and the zeal for the homechurch to reach out to their
local community, like it spursthem on to pick up their sword
and swing it, you know, withtheir coworker or a lost family
member, and so they're not atodds at each other.

Speaker 1 (37:24):
Yeah that's well said .

Speaker 4 (37:25):
They're actually serving one another.
So, as we want to see churchesplanted among unreached language
groups, churches should neverfear that that's at odds with us
reaching out to our neighbors.
In fact, it should encourage usand spur us on to do that very
thing.

Speaker 1 (37:39):
That's really well said.
And then that concept toanother one of Jay's points, of
kind of seeing another soldier,someone that's also been
swinging the sword.
And then this you know, afterthe battle you will be standing
firm.
You know to know the feeling oftaking part in moving a people
group from completely unaware towalking with Christ, to a

(38:03):
healthy, disciple-making,indigenous-led church and the
Bible in their heart language.
And then standing firm, jay,what's it like to stand firm
after that work is done?

Speaker 2 (38:16):
So I'll go back a little bit, dustin, if you'll
indulge me, because I want yourlisteners to hear just what the
privilege is like to be thefirst person to share the gospel
with a people group that'snever heard it before.
I actually think this is one ofthe—it probably will never be
matched in my life in terms ofthe privilege, because there's
something about you know, all ofus have been engaged, hopefully

(38:38):
, in evangelism where we are.
But if you're in America andyou're in a culture you know
that already has heard thegospel many, many times, a lot
of times you're scattering seedon a place that's had seed
thrown on it over and over andover again, and so you're just,
you know, every once in a whileyou'll get one seed that'll
bounce the right way and land ingood soil and you're like, wow,
this is so cool.
But most you know you just seea lot of seeds that land on hard

(39:01):
packed ground that's alreadyhad seed cast on it before.
And the interesting thing isthe challenge of getting to an
unreached people group is offthe scale.
Like just getting there andgetting to the place where you
speak the language well enoughand you can share it with them
is very, very challenging.
But when you've made thatjourney and you've climbed up
three mountain ranges and you'reway back in, you know, hacked

(39:22):
your way through the jungle andyou're back in there, a lot of
times you're scattering seed ona place where no one's ever
thrown seed before.
Yeah right, and sometimes theHoly Spirit has just prepared it
in a unique way and you get tobe a part of something that's
utterly amazing.
So in our case, when we finallyreached the level of language
that we needed to to be able tobegin translating Bible lessons

(39:42):
into this language, we began andwe were trying to gather the
Chong people and we were very,very discouraged.
We were like you know, there'sjust no spiritual interest here.
We've been in the field foreight years.
We know believers you know whatare we doing here?
Like this has been such atremendous sacrifice.
Our kids are struggling, we'restruggling.
You know this business isfalling apart.

(40:02):
We're being, you know, stolenfrom by the mafia and
interrogated by the government,and you know it just felt like
this is never going to happen.
You know who are we kidding?
And we finally convinced threepeople that were, like you know,
friends of friends to come inand listen to these.
You know we were talking aboutlike we want to share with you
God's story, and we finallyconvinced these people to come

(40:24):
and they sit down and we gothrough lesson number one and
all we do is we just openGenesis 1, and we read it and we
talk about it.
You know, god made everythingin the world and he said that it
was good.
And then we just ask them thisquestion at the end of the night
.
You know, when you look aroundthe world, does it seem like
it's good?
And they were like you know, no, it actually seems pretty
terrible, like I'm, you know, asmore I think about it.

(40:45):
There's all this disease andsickness and death, and, you
know, there's all these problemsand good things happen to bad
people and bad things happen togood people.
It doesn't make any sense.
And so they were like well, why?
Why did God say it was good?
We're like well, you got tocome back next week, you know,
and this began this process.
That's like the greatestprivilege in my life, because
you're throwing seeds in a placeit's never been.
And so they come back inGenesis 3, and it's like okay,

(41:07):
let's read Genesis 3 tonight.
And it's like now I see why theworld is so messed up.
Adam and Eve sinned and theybrought this curse of sin and
death.
But God promises one day one ofEve's descendants is going to
come and crush the head of thatserpent and set you free from
that curse.
And they're like who is it?
Because they don't know thespoilers.
Yeah, that's the.
That's the thing about going toan unreached language group.

(41:27):
They don't.

Speaker 1 (41:28):
They don't know the story y'all bringing him over
here when's he get here, when'sthe plane?

Speaker 2 (41:32):
when's the plane exactly?
So so we're like you know, hey,you got to come back next week,
right?
So we read their story afterstory and they're constantly
waiting.
And what this did was it droveso much interest because these
three guys who were kind of halfinterested are all of a sudden
going back and telling theirsister about it.
And one of them comes and hegoes hey, I told my sister about
these stories and she wants tocome here.
And then that sister went andtold her coworker and it's like,

(41:54):
hey, that lady wants to comeand hear these stories Because,
you know, she just was likedrawn by it.
I was telling her you know whatthe Bible said, and and I want
to come hear it.
And so pretty soon we werefilling up our living room and
all of a sudden we're, we'repacked, and we got to, we got to
split and you know, hey, youguys, we're going to keep going
on Tuesdays and you new guys,we'll start over next Thursday
and we'll meet you on Thursdays.
And we, group after group aftergroup, for this brief little

(42:17):
season, the Holy spirit was justworking and these guys were
everybody that showed up.
You know, is it.
Is it seth?
Is it, uh, noah?
Is it this guy?
Is it that guy?
They're waiting for this onethat's going to set them free
from this curse.
And we get to the story ofabraham, and it's like they get
this big promise about how,through your descendants, all
the families on the earth aregoing to be blessed.
And they're like oh, this isdefinitely the guy.

(42:38):
And then isaac is born in thiscrazy miraculous way.
And they're like here he is,this is the person who's going
to set us free.
And then what happens?
God says, hey, go, take abramisaac up and sacrifice him.
And they're like no, you knowthey're, they're mad, they're
like what is god doing?
you know that's, that's the guythat's gonna, you know, make the
world right again.
And but what happens?
A ram dies in his place.

(43:01):
We get to Passover.
A lamb, an innocent lamb, dieson behalf of you know, to keep
them from God's curse.
And we just stress this overand over again.
We're going through the wholeOld Testament and the lamb dies
on the behalf of the sinners.
The innocent lamb dies.
And I'll never forget when wegot to the passage where we
finally got to Jesus and Johnthe Baptist meets Jesus.

(43:23):
Do you remember what he sayswhen he first sees him?
He looks up and he says beholdthe lamb of God that takes away
the sin of the world.
And one of the ladies in theback shouted out he's going to
die.
And I thought to myself oh, myword, this is happening.
They're getting this storybecause in all of scripture
there's only one purpose for alamb.

(43:44):
A lamb comes, an innocent lambto die on behalf of sinners.
Over and, over and over again,we've seen this in the story and
they were recognizing what Johnmeant when he said that Jesus
was the lamb of God and theywere ready, when Jesus died on
the cross, to say, okay, I wantto accept that sacrifice for
myself.

(44:04):
And we didn't see this repeatedagain.
It wasn't something thathappened over and over again,
but for this brief, maybe five,six months in our ministry we
saw a tremendous outpouring ofthe Holy Spirit.
We saw a number of these peoplecome to know the Lord and we
were able to raise up a churchin what felt like a very short
amount of time, after years andyears and years of laying
groundwork, of learning language, of running business, of

(44:27):
struggling through visas, of allthese things that we had gone
through.
Our teammates all left.
We were there all by ourselves.
After many, many years of all ofthat happening, all of a sudden
the Holy Spirit was poured out.
We got to throw seeds on afield that we turned out.
The spirit had irrigated andplowed for us and we're just
throwing seeds and everywherewe're looking, the seeds are
coming up, it's landing on goodsoil and we saw about 55, 60

(44:53):
people come to know the Lord ina very short little period of
time and we had a church wherethere wasn't one before.
And it was just this time in mylife when I don't think it'll
ever be repeated again, but itwas such a privilege to be a
part of that and what the Lorddid there, and yeah, how did you
sleep at night?

Speaker 1 (45:12):
Like how hard was it not to skip ahead in the story.

Speaker 2 (45:16):
It was actually really, really hard, because the
weird thing is, because ofCentral Asia's long and
complicated history with theRussian Empire, they have a
perception that they know whoJesus is.
They've heard his name before.
So it wasn't that they weretotally ignorant of the story,
but they had it from a totallydifferent concept.
The only perception they had ofJesus was that's who.
When the czars sent, you know,those Russian troops in here to

(45:39):
take over our land and enslaveour people and steal our natural
resources, they were carryingthe banner that has a cross on
it.
You know, they always had apriest out front, and so they
just knew Jesus as he's theRussian God.
That's who he is.
He's that those white peoplethat came here to steal us and
and oppress us and enslave us.
That's their god.

(45:59):
So for them, that's who jesuswas, and for them to hear him as
a concept.
That was totally flipping thescript, where it was like, no,
he's not just the god of theseoutsiders that oppressed us,
he's God.

Speaker 1 (46:12):
You know, what stands out to me.
It stands out to me and it'scausing all sorts of mixed
emotions in me right now is howfew people get to experience the
story of the Bible in that wayfor the first time.
When you live in America or theWest and you're popping in and

(46:36):
out of church and you go to awedding and you go to a funeral
and this and that, and then youfinally start going and you know
they're in Galatians, right,they're way ahead in the story,
and you know you start to get itall, but you're getting it from
a different vantage.
I mean to hear it, to have itpresented for the first time
ever from Genesis through, andbe on pins and needles for six

(46:59):
months.
Who's this character?
Who's this character?
Who's this character?
Is this the one?
Is this the one?
Is this the one?
And then to get there, that issuch a beautiful thing.
It just makes me start thinkinglike, how do we recreate that?
How do we do that differentlyin the west?
And I don't know that we can,but man that to get to that

(47:21):
point and see 55, 60 people andsee that church, jay, I'm, I'm
just, I've got goosebumps.
Man, like that's, you say youwon't recreate that in your life
, but but you know you're goingto help others recreate it
through the leadership of GSI.
You're going to, you're goingto live through it vicariously
and that's what a lot of us do.

(47:42):
I mean, it looks like you and Iare close to the same age.
You go from kind of being, youknow, the star player on the
field, running your business andgetting your clients and doing
your things, to more of thefront office right where you're
mentoring and you're raising upothers and you're empowering
them to do the work.
And I think that's part of thebeautiful role of being a part
of the church is that your roleschange.

(48:02):
You're not always doing thesame thing.
You know, at some point you'relearning, then you're playing,
then you're coaching.

Speaker 2 (48:10):
Yeah, actually, you know, the funny thing is I
actually think that this task isone that we have handed over to
missions agencies as churchesfor far too long.
I think that there's a weirdthing that happened maybe in the
1700s, 1800s when, like WilliamCarey and Adam and Adam Judson
and these guys are being sentout In the churches back in

(48:34):
those days were kind ofreawakened to the concept of
missions, and so they're puttingguys on boats, you know, and
they're going nine months away,you know, to go to Burma or
whatever, and you just think howare we supposed to keep that
guy accountable to the task thatwe sent him out?
What are we supposed to do ifhe gets off course, if he starts
doing you know, if he fallsinto sin?
And so they invented thesethings called you know missions
agencies, or at the time youthese things called you know
missions agencies, or at thetime, you know mission societies

(48:55):
, and they would appoint youknow a leader to go over there
and kind of, you know rule overthe other missionaries and you
know direct their ministries,and I think that that was
probably wise at the time.
But I think that we've sort ofinherited a lot of inertia from
that time period where thechurch has said for far too long
, let's just hand this to anagency and then do the what one

(49:17):
of my friends at Uptrendcollected called pay pray and
get out of the way Like let'sjust, you know, we, we pray for
these people, we send them money, but other than that, they work
for the mission agency.
And I actually think that one ofthe things the Lord is calling
us to is to recognize thatactually in in today's world, if
we were starting the modernmissions movement, we wouldn't
invent an agency that stood inbetween the church and the

(49:39):
workers on the field.
We would say, hey, the churchcan just pick up and be on a
Zoom call with somebody inTajikistan or China or Laos in
five minutes.
So there's no reason why thechurch can't still maintain a
measure of authority in thelives and ministries of those
workers overseas.
And I think when we do that, westart to see the beauty of what
you're talking about.
We start to see like the wholechurch awakening to say this is

(50:02):
actually our task.
This isn't something wecommission somebody else we give
a certain percentage of ourbudget to and we get to say
that's not ours anymore.
But we as a church can be apart of this conversation.

Speaker 1 (50:13):
Yeah, that's yeah.
Well, that just brings back toSean's point right of how one
informs the other and how theykind of work together in support
of each other.
And you know, it makes me think, too, like there's a huge
opportunity to remove thisinertia and to empower more
churches to take an active role,instead of this pay, pray and

(50:33):
get out of the way model andsame guys with every individual
that's a member of the churchthat's sitting out in the pews.
Your job is not to pay, prayand get out of the way for the
church to do the work either.
Right, your job is Monday toSaturday, not just Sunday
morning.
And the opportunity for everyoneto play a role in the task

(50:54):
remaining and in the GreatCommission whether you're
sending or you're going oryou're praying, or you're
funding or you're welcoming oryou're mobilizing it's there,
and it may be a spectrum for youwhere at certain seasons of
life you do more or you do itdifferent, but to both of your
points, I think the opportunityhere is for everyone to take a
step forward into the taskremaining, to challenge the

(51:15):
status quo of your church, yourlocal church, and what they're
doing now, and be a part ofseeing some change, in taking a
more active role.
And hey, you know, sean Cooper,with GSI, is ready to talk to
you about it and talk to youabout how to engage, how to
shift.
What are other churches doing?
How can it be done?
Well, and you know, let'shumble ourselves and admit we

(51:37):
don't have it all right.
You know the task remaining isnot done.
You know there's thousands ofpeople groups left to be reached
, there's hundreds of languagesstill waiting for the Bible to
be translated and with thetechnology we have today and the
new methods and the things thatwe featured on the podcast
recently, like Seed Bible andApologistai, like it's here, the
time is here, right, I mean,let's get after it.

Speaker 4 (52:01):
You know, dustin, as you talk about folks playing a
different role, I often think of.
You know, sort of my role assomebody who's been in
recruitment and mobilization fora decade and a half really is
kind of like Philip.
You know, there in John chapterone, where you know he says to

(52:21):
Nathaniel come and see.
Philip is saying to Nathanielhey, come and see.
And I feel like so much of myrole in recruitment and
mobilization is to go to localchurches and to say, hey, come
and see what God has done to seea church planted in these
unreached language groups andhow God might be able to use you
to do something like he didthrough Jay, broken and flawed
as he is.
You know, come and see whatGod's done, come and see what

(52:42):
God will do.
Come and see what God's gonnado to see this task finished.
So you know, if you're listening, don't be ashamed to think of
yourself as someone in the shoesof Philip.
You know, calling Nathaniel tocome and see, to come and see.
Or Ananias to be the one whoyou know went and was the bridge
to Saul.
You know those sort offorgotten characters that get

(53:04):
overlooked.
You can play a part in God's,you know his greater purpose.
Whether you're the Paul youknow, or whether you're the
Ananias.

Speaker 2 (53:12):
I think that there's a role in missions today that is
not exercised by the churchvery often that possibly people
are unaware of.
But I actually think that,because most of the unreached
language groups that are left inthe world are in closed
countries, almost allmissionaries that go to those
people if you're going to livethere long enough to learn their
language and, you know,proclaim the gospel to them,

(53:34):
you're going to have to run somesort of business.
And I'll just say flat out foryou guys, so that you understand
most missionaries are terribleat business.
Live for decades in this placeand swap mosquitoes and learn

(53:57):
languages and communicatecross-culturally is almost
exactly polar opposite to thekind of skill set that makes you
a good businessman.
And so we actually have noticedover and over again at GSI that
one of the greatest ways thechurch can be involved is I
guarantee most churches have adozen guys sitting there that
are gifted businessmen thataren't even aware that they
could have a significant role toplay in the ministry of someone

(54:19):
on the other side of the worldwho's trying to go into an
unreached language group.
In our particular situation, wewere running a business that
involved processing a certainkind of agricultural product and
I knew nothing about it.
You know, it's like every timeI come to my office.
It was like a nightmare.
You know, I've got to decidewhat should the price of my
product be this week?
Should I, you know, buy thisnew shower or not?

(54:42):
It costs $30,000.
It would improve my yields by1%, you know, is that worth the
investment?
Is there good ROI?
Like, I'm just terrible at allof that kind of stuff.
And so we actually had a guyfrom our church who used to be
the CFO of I can't remember ifit was Verizon or Sprint, but he
would get on a call with meonce a week to just walk me
through.
Hey, here's the decisions thatyou need to make.

(55:04):
Here's what I'm thinking.
Here's some pricing guidelines.
Don't sell if the price goesover.
You know this, all these kindsof things.
You know, just like these littledecisions that we had no clue
and that allowed our church toget this new way of being
involved in our ministry, wherethat guy, because of the fact
that we're talking, you know,every week now he's going back

(55:26):
to the rest of the church andsaying, hey, you know, did you
know that this thing is going on?
And it wasn't always business.
You know, because ourconversations were just good.
He's not interested in thebusiness just for the sake of
the business.
You know, we didn't move allthe way over there to become
millionaires.
We moved over there because wewanted to see a church
established.
So he's bringing that news backto the rest of the body, you
know, sharing it excitedly inhis men's group and, you know,

(55:47):
to the elders on the Sundaymorning and it's like all of a
sudden this was just feedinginto the ability the church had
to participate in what we weredoing on the other side of the
world.

Speaker 1 (55:57):
Yeah, no, that's great.
So globalswitchboardio is whereyou can go in as a business
person or missionary or anyoneanyone.
If you're good at sewing, youcan go in and you can build a
profile and say this is what I'mgood at.
And then churches and sendingorganizations and companies that
are running all over the worldwill have their profiles and

(56:19):
somebody will say I needsomebody that's good at this,
and then you'll get connected tothem and it'll say, hey, let's
have an intro call, and it'llset up a Zoom and you'll have a
one-hour intro call and then youcan do exactly what Jay just
said.
We've featured this story acouple of times and people that
have met through SwitchboardI've been connected to people on
Switchboard.
Clint's been connected.
It is so, so cool.

(56:42):
So the tech is out there rightnow to support this.
Okay, Jay, give us a story andthen pick one of the languages
you speak, Pray us out in thatone and then translate it to
English for us.

Speaker 2 (56:58):
I was thinking of.
You know different stories, butthe one that I personally find
the most compelling is the storyof a young girl who I'm going
to call Lina.
Lina is a Chon person, so shegrew up in a very, very
challenging environment.
So the Chon people historicallylived kind of on the steppe,
the plains of Central Asia,herding goats and sheep.
They usually live in yurts, orMongolians call them gers, these

(57:19):
mobile kind of tents that youcan pack up and move every time
your sheep eat everything.
Within a half day's walk youpack up your yurt and you move
it down the valley and you setit up again.
And so you know just a verychallenging environment to grow
up in, very, very cold, very,very harsh, and a very
challenging environment to growup in Very, very cold, very,
very harsh, and a culture thatis animistic in its practice,

(57:40):
even if they would describethemselves as Buddhist, and so I
don't know if your listenersare aware of, kind of what it
means to be an animist, butfunctionally speaking, it's
basically the belief system thatthere are some sort of
spiritual forces that control mylife and I need to make those
spirits happy, the belief systemthat there are some sort of
spiritual forces that control mylife and I, I need to make
those spirits happy, and so I goto the shaman, I go to the
witch doctor or I go to thebuddhist mama and I do something

(58:02):
, and that will theoreticallymake the spirits happy, and then
then good things will happen tome.
The problem with this beliefsystem is that well one, it's
not true, it's directly from theenemy, but functionally it
doesn't work, because it doesn'tmatter how many times you go to
the shaman and he tells you,you know, sacrifice a reindeer
and make sure that it falls sothat the feet are pointing
towards the rising sun, and thenyour aunt will be cured of

(58:22):
cancer.
Well, you do it, and then youraunt dies anyway.
And so after a while, whatbegins to dominate your life is
this fear, because you neverknow, as an animistic person, if
you've done enough to pleasethe spirits.
You know, did I kill?
Should I kill two reindeer?
Should I give the shaman anextra bottle of vodka so that he
can, you know, chant for evenlonger to the spirits?

(58:44):
You know, I never know if I'vedone enough to get the things
that I want.
And so, uh, lena's parents were,her father, especially, was an
alcoholic.
Because of this extreme fear,this just extremely challenging
environment she's growing up inwhere they're scared all the
time that something bad is goingto happen to them because they
haven't pleased the spirits.
But they don't.

(59:05):
There's no way to know that.
Oh, I've finally done enoughfor the spirits to be happy with
me.
So Lena grows up in thisenvironment.
Her father is extremelycontrolling, drunk, beats her
mom beats her, and she's seekingfor something.
And she had a classmate thatwas the daughter of one of the
guys that got saved pretty earlyon in our ministry.

(59:28):
That daughter invites Lena tocome with her to these Bible
lessons that we're doing and atfirst she doesn't really want to
come.
She comes and sits in on a fewjust because she wants to get
out of her house.
Basically she's not looking foranything spiritual, she just
doesn't want to be around herdad.
And she's there.
And the way she tells hertestimony is beautiful because

(59:49):
she says first I resisted thestories, then I started
listening to them and then Ifell in love with them.
So these stories that workthrough the Old Testament of who
God is, what he's doing, whathe's promising to send, and then
finally Jesus actually arrivingand she just falls totally in
love with Jesus.
And she's a little girl she'sprobably like 16 years old when

(01:00:10):
I first meet her, when we'regoing through these stories, and
I used to have to drive becausethe bus lines would stop
running at a certain time in theevening and so you know, if we
went too late it was like, youknow, everybody's got to get a
ride home, so they'd all pileinto my little station wagon.
I'm like dropping them off.
You know that was all thepeople that were trying to get
to the Bible study and Iremember her very distinctly
because she would always ask tobe dropped off at least two

(01:00:30):
blocks away from her house, thatshe did not want her dad to
know she was going to this.
And so you know, I'm droppingher off a couple blocks and she
walks and sneaks in and pretendsshe's just been out doing you
know whatever.
I don't know what story shetold her dad, um, but when, when
jesus, she finally hears thestory of jesus's death, burial
and resurrection, she comes toknow the lord and she's just
full of joy and she goes backand she tells her parents hey,

(01:00:54):
I'm going to be baptized as achristian.
And this is just instant.
You know, excommunication fromany chun function, right like
the chun people are like veryproud of the fact that we have
never been dominated by any ofthese empires that you know have
come over and oppressed us.
We, we stand strong in ourresistance.
And for you to join our enemiesthat's that's what they're
perceiving, this resistance.
And for you to join our enemiesthat's what they're perceiving

(01:01:15):
this, as you know.
For you to say that you'regoing to go join the God of
those people that oppressed us,like how could you do that?
It's part of our ethnicidentity is that we are opposed
to Christianity.
And so her dad immediately tellsher she has to leave the house.
It's one in the morning andit's minus 30 degrees outside,
you know, and it's like get out,leave the house.
It's one in the morning andit's minus 30 degrees outside,
you know, and it's like get outof my house.

(01:01:36):
You're not my daughter anymore,I don't want to speak to you.
So she gets out, she calls oneof the other believers, you know
, they take her in and she'sliving with them for a few
months, and a few months laterwe were actually back in the US,
they had a baptism service, andso she was one of the people
that was baptized, and so Iasked one of the elders of the
church.
I said, what was it likebaptizing Lena?
Because it must've been kind ofbittersweet for her, because

(01:01:57):
baptism is the moment whereyou're making a public
profession of faith.
There's no more going back onthis.
I can't pretend that.
I just, you know, I wasquestioning and now I'm back in
the fold.
Now I've, I've publiclyidentified myself with Christ
and her family will never speakto her again.
You, her, nobody that she andpeople won't work with you.
If you're a christian, likeyou're, you're probably cutting
yourself off from a job, fromyour family.

(01:02:19):
And I said it must have beenkind of bittersweet for her in
that moment, knowing all thatshe was giving up.
And the elder guy guy says helooks at me, he goes jay, I've
never seen anything like itbefore.
She was like a bride on herwedding day.
She was so infused with the joyof the lord because, despite
all that she's giving up, she'sfound something greater.
You know she's exchangingeverything that she owns to go

(01:02:41):
buy a field, but she knows inthat field there's a treasure
that far outshines everything.
She gave up the body goodreference.
And I just think that that'sthat's the story of the chun
people and the ministry there isthat it's not that you, you
know, the Lord has taken awaytheir hardships and made it just
so that everything worked outgreat and it's been super easy

(01:03:02):
for the new believers, but it'sbeen that they've seen a greater
joy than everything they had tosacrifice and that they
continue to do that and thatjust has been such an
encouragement and inspirationfor me in my own walk with
Christ.
Just to say, you know, what amI giving up?
Okay, it's worth it.
You know, christ is worthwhatever I have to give up.
It's not a question of you know.

(01:03:24):
Oh, I don't know, I wanted tobe more comfortable, or I wanted
to have more money, or I wantedto have more stability in my
life.
It's like whatever I have togive up if I get Christ to the
other side of it, it's totallyworth it.

Speaker 4 (01:03:35):
JM reminded of Paul's words where he says having
nothing, yet possessingeverything.

Speaker 1 (01:03:41):
Yeah, that's a fantastic story.
Prayers up for Lena for sure.
Just beautiful man, would youpray for the listeners first in
Russian and then translate forus in English on our way out?

Speaker 3 (01:03:52):
everywhere, lord, so that they understand that you
are ready to help them when theyare ready to serve you, and so

(01:04:18):
that they see your glory ineverything they do.
Lord, I ask that you do allthis in the name of your Son,
lord Jesus, amen.

Speaker 2 (01:04:31):
And I just pray that my brothers and sisters would be
able to understand that,wherever they are, that they can
serve the Lord and that theycan see His glory in how they
serve Him.

Speaker 1 (01:04:44):
Amen, amen.
Thanks for being with us, seanJay, gsi Listeners, check them
out and we'll be back with yousoon.
We've got a guest coming up.
That is a significant part ofwhat I would call the rising
tide that lifts all boats.
What their work does informsall of the mission's work around

(01:05:07):
the world, so stay tuned, we'vegot some fun stuff coming.
Thank you for listening toUnreached.
Some fun stuff coming.
Thank you for listening toUnreached.
Our sincere desire is that whatyou've heard today will cause
you to see the mission of Goddifferently and your role in it
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(01:05:29):
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