Over the years, we have developed a number of key international partnerships with the body of Christ in Southeast Asia focused on church-based community development. Our International Partnerships are founded on the following principles:
¨ Quality over Quantity: we focus on a smaller quantity of key strategic partnerships that we can pour quality time, attention and resource into rather than being spread thin with a large quantity of partnerships that have a lower quality of relationship. This is why we have intentionally invested in a fewer number of international partnerships with more focused attention.
¨ Regional Focus: we focus on a particular region of the world, Vietnam and Cambodia, so that we can get to know not only our partners but the place in which they live (its culture, history and people) and work together with local leadership in the region (government, business, health, education and non-profit sectors, etc.) This is why we have intentionally focused our partnerships in Vietnam and Cambodia.
¨ Church-centered: we believe God has entrusted the proclamation and display of his gospel to the local church. God has not called Imago Dei to be the church in Hanoi or Phnom Penh, he has called the church in Hanoi and Phnom Penh to be the church in Hanoi and Phnom Penh. Where healthy, national churches exist we do not seek to start our own initiative but to listen and learn from the local vision God has given his people and seek strategic opportunities for partnership.
¨ Proclamation and Presence: Jesus proclaimed the good news of God’s kingdom with his teaching and displayed it with his actions. We believe Jesus empowers his church with the privilege of doing the same: teaching those around us about God and constructively bearing His presence in our communities as salt and light. Our international partnerships seek to embody this holistic integration of word and deed, proclamation and presence.
¨ Indigenous Leadership: we believe God is raising up national leaders around the world who are indigenous to their area. They know the language and culture of their neighborhood and are better equipped than us to understand the contextualization of the gospel there. We seek to locate mature indigenous leadership and place ourselves underneath their broader vision in relationship, service and support.
¨ Missionaries: we send long-term missionaries to places where there is little to no gospel presence. In most of the world, there are healthy, established churches with indigenous national leadership. In those parts of the world, we seek to partner with the indigenous church that is already there. In parts of the world lacking healthy, indigenous church presence, we send long-term missionaries with the ultimate hope of seeing healthy indigenous churches planted under national leadership.
Get Connected. There are a number of avenues for learning more about our international partners.
¨ Sundays: on Sundays, we often share stories and videos from our partners and annually seek to bring at least one of our partners to Portland per year to preach on Sunday and speak into our discipleship and formation as followers of Jesus here from a global perspective.
¨ Global Mission Class: our “Intro to Global Mission” class (offered every Fall and Spring) offers an opportunity to not only learn more about our theology of global mission but to learn significantly more about our international partners and the ministries they are involved with. It is a great way to meet others interested or involved in global mission at Imago Dei, to learn more about our international partners and a launching pad towards next steps for further involvement with our global ministries. For more info, click here.
¨ Global Prayer Night: our Global Prayer group meets monthly to pray for our partners and interns internationally. The group keeps updated on recent developments with our partners and friends around the world and provides an opportunity to both learn more about these ministries around the world and to pray with and for them. For more info, click here.
¨ Short-Term Trips: we do 2 – 3 short-term trips per year which exist to strengthen our long-term relationships with our partners in SE Asia. These are great opportunities to meet our partners firsthand, to be exposed to the work of God’s kingdom around the world and to be shaped and formed as a follower of Jesus in the 21st century by an international perspective on the gospel. For more info, click here.
