Germany | Believers Finding “More” With Jesus Through Making Disciples
Eddy was a church planter with a passion to see the gospel move in Germany, but…these churches weren’t really growing or multiplying, and everyday people weren’t becoming activated to live out their faith. At the same time, Eddy saw a lot of people asking Jesus for “more.” He realized the answer to their desire was for them to become effective disciple makers.
Novo began equipping Eddy to equip others with tools to share the good news, and Eddy began training people to be “hope carriers” in their unique contexts. “If you’re a farmer, YOU are the best person to reach other farmers,” he would say. He’d tell doctors, “You are the best hope carrier to the hospital.” Business people could reach others in business, moms could reach other moms. It wasn’t the local pastor or missionary (i.e. Eddy) who was most equipped to reach each person’s neighbors—they were! “We cannot reach everybody,” Eddy’s wife Ruth said. “We are not the ones who transform peoples’ lives, not at all. We need to humble ourselves and learn the way Jesus did it. And Jesus had disciples but he also sent them out!”
This strategy worked! Farmers, business owners, moms, students—all prayed for God to give them people to share the good news with and God answered. They led Discovery Bible Studies with many non-believers and people came to faith and were baptized. And those activated believers were discovering the “more” with God they had longed for.
Over the last six months Eddy has seen incredible fruit in his own town, and in several other towns (and countries) nearby. He trained 300 believers and 80 pastors from different cities in prayer and disciple-making. Together with a team they put on “Nights of Hope” in four cities—big events with worship, testimonies, food trucks, and the hope of the gospel shared in a public place that brought Christians from all different denominations together. More than 400 people became followers of Jesus at those events! Eddy mentored 10 teams of young, on-fire adults (including his kids), who went on outreach road trips around Europe. The teams prayed, depended on God to show them what to do, and shared the good news, and it resulted in many salvations and DBS groups. Now Eddy believes God has “more” for his family as well, to impact not only his city, and not only Germany, but all of Europe with the hope of Jesus.
