BILD News

2007 BILD International Summit October 31—November 10. We hope you will join us this year for BILD's annual Summit. Once again the Summit will provide the training and the resources needed for church leaders around the globe to train the leaders that they need—training for new international partners, ongoing training for current international partners, and Antioch School Certification training.

Inquirers and supporters of BILD can come Thursday evening through Saturday morning, November 8–10, for opportunities to catch up on developments at BILD and to see and hear what God is doing through church-based theological education around the globe!

We want to help you train the leaders that you need. Check our Summit pages for specific sessions, schedules, costs, how to prepare, and how to register.

Friends of BILD. Each year we receive many requests for training from internationals, who have significant ministries and networks, that we would like to bring to the Summit for training. If you would like to help fund the strengthening and expansion of the church in a given country by equipping national leaders, please call us for presenting opportunities (515-292-7012).

PRESS RELEASE: Antioch School of Church Planting and Leadership Development. (September 12, 2006) In the Antioch tradition of "the way of Christ and His Apostles," BILD International is announcing the launch of a unique higher education institution, BILD International University's Antioch School of Church Planting and Leadership Development. The Antioch School brings together church-based theological education and academic degrees to serve churches and church planting networks in the U.S. and around the world. The new school is an innovative, visionary, and mission institution rooted firmly on biblical concepts of in-service, nonformal ministry training. Full Story.

More than Academics at Its Best. (April 2006) Sixteen students from India, Nigeria, and the United States gathered on March 6–17, 2006, for the launch of the new BILD/Gordon-Conwell partnership and the first cohort of the Doctor of Ministry in Global Church-Based Theological Education. These are students who already have significant ministries, working on projects that are not hypothetical considerations of things that might be, but development, implementation, and evaluation of real, cutting edge church-based theological education. Walter Kaiser, Gary Parrett, and Richard Lints from Gordon-Conwell and Ted Ward, Art Miller, and Jeff Reed were just some of the faculty who shared their expertise, all contributing to make this "more than academics at its best!" Full Story.

C-BTE Australia—A Year in Review. (June 1, 2006) The year included honing their vision, knowledge, and skills in applying the C-BTE philosophy and using church-based resources. The C-BTE Australia team worked in each of their States with delight to see new believers get established in their faith and be baptized, to see new leaders prepared to teach small groups, and to see church leaders grow in vision and mature together through study of leadership courses. With sharpened vision, they are building a large pool of committed young people that will birth, in four to five years, the initial leaders and church planters needed to make the vision of multiplying churches in Australia a reality. Full Story.

The BILD Certification System: Helping Churches, Denominations, and Networks of Churches Develop Leaders. (April 2006) After thirty years of working to produce resources and tools to help churches develop and implement non-formal, cradle-to-grave theological education programs, BILD International has finally released a tested and proven process for this exact purpose—the BILD Certification System. It has one purpose: to help churches, denominations, and networks of churches develop the leaders required for the continued strength of churches and the expansion of the gospel. The three parts to the BILD Certification System include (1) Paradigm Transformation Projects, which help church leaders see how their current forms don't necessarily fulfill the functions required by the work of the gospel; (2) Non-Formal Indigenous Programs—workshops in training 5 types of leaders; and (3) BILD Resources—understanding BILD's resources, which use a process of learning in community to create leadership teams and churches that are unified around the strength of the church and the expansion of the gospel. Full Story.

Cambodia Update—A Church Within Every Village. (January 2006) Encouraged by a national strategy, a detailed plan to accomplish it, 8,000–10,000 leaders in training, and leadership assessment tools, the key Cambodian leaders believe it's within their reach to see a church within every town and village in Cambodia. Full Story.

Nigeria: Foundations Laid—Ready for Expansion. (February, 2006) With Musa Asake now as full-time director, an executive team ready with a national strategy, and a team of 160 Type III Leaders who are using the way of Christ and His Apostles to carry out their ministries, BILD-Nigeria is ready for expansion. The days ahead seem limitless in potential for the Nigerian Church and the expansion of the Gospel there. Full Story.

ACCESS-ible Education. (April 2006) Making education more accessible to those who need it most has long been a driving desire of Steve Kemp, Director of Institutional Partnerships for BILD International. In January he added to his responsibilities becoming President of ACCESS, the professional association of Christian distance and accessible education. During his presidency, he hopes to strengthen the organization's commitment to accessible education, particularly nonformal church-based theological education and competency-based academic credentialing. He can envision academic institutions granting academic credentials to someone it hasn't trained, based on assessment of competencies, which opens the door for all sorts of education that are valued, based on their effectiveness, not their formality. He hopes ACCESS will have a leading role in a future consultation on church/seminary relations. Full Story.

Strategic Autumn in Ames. (December 21, 2005) More than 50 select international leaders were in Ames October 24 through November 18 to receive 4 weeks of concentrated training from BILD trainers in how to equip small group leaders to national level leaders, which they need now to strengthen their churches and in the future as they respond to rapid church growth. Twenty-four leaders from 9 large church-planting movements in India were here as well as key leaders from 16 other countries. They received training in how to think about church-based training, how to use BILD resources to equip leaders, how to make ordered plans for training Type I–V Leaders, and how to plan for the tremendous church growth needs that so many of them face. It was strategic for the leaders. It was strategic for BILD. And it was strategic for Oakwood Road Church, who hosted the leaders in their homes and hosted the training. The training was supplemented, observed, and critiqued by many distinguished guests. Full Story.

Seek the Welfare of the City—Citizenship, Benefactors, and Money. (December 21, 2005) Looking back at the Early Church and how Paul's missionary journeys were funded, Jeff Reed taught a series of 11 messages at Oakwood Road Church entitled Seek the Welfare of the City—Citizenship, Benefactors, and Money. This series explores, biblically, these issues as they relate to money, evangelical involvement in public life, and funding of the global missionary enterprise—critical issues for many church and church network leaders. Because of the newness of these ideas and the effect that we have already seen, this series will be made available early in 2006 to challenge others to become benefactors—to use their resources to become co-laborers and participate in the progress of the Gospel. Full Story.

Benefiting Others—A Report from a Benefactor Household. (December 21, 2005) There are costs of being a "benefactor household"—time, energy, funds. But the need to really partner with leaders that God is clearly using to bring people to Christ and to strengthen His church—locally and around the world—is a need that this couple decided, biblically, they must help meet! The privilege of being a co-laborer in what God is doing and the blessing of being encouraged by the faith of church leaders, some from the other side of the globe, has energized this couple. Full Report.

New Improved Acts Course! BILD's flagship course, Acts: Keys to the Establishment and Expansion of the First Century Church, has received a major update of eight new articles, which brings the course up to date on the research on social structure and the history of the Early Church. It's a significant update that will make the course even more effective in empowering church planters and leaders of churches and church movements in fulfilling the Great Commission. Full Story.

See more information and a sample of the course Acts: Keys to the Establishment and Expansion of the First Century Church.

Operation Nigeria: Progress Report March 2005. C-BLD Nigeria is poised for its 2nd generation of expansion because 3 foundational objectives have been accomplished: (1) An early round of 200 influential leaders have been trained over 3 years. (2) Multiplication has already begun as these 200 leaders passed on their training to 5,000 additional leaders. (3) Fifty gifted leaders have emerged from this group to help Dr. Musa Asake lead C-BLD Nigeria. These leadership foundations usher in a new phase in the training and expansion of the Nigerian project. Pray for these leaders, the needed resources for their goals, and for God to encourage and strengthen the Church in Nigeria so that they may be active about His purposes. Full Story.