Celebrating God’s Goodness: Prayerfully Planning for the Future

Lausanne Movement Update

Lausanne is a global movement that mobilizes evangelical leaders to collaborate for world evangelization.  By the grace of God, The Lausanne Movement serves the global body of Christ as a catalyst for world evangelization by:

• Investing in the lives of Christian leaders around the world who are “reflective practitioners” (including younger leaders, leaders who are women, oral preference leaders and non-Internet connected leaders);
• Connecting and convening global Christian leaders for focused discussion, prayer and strategic action related to the issues before the church and God’s world;
• Communicating ideas, strategy and action on important mission and evangelization topics using both traditional media and new media.

Undergirding Lausanne’s work is a steadfast commitment to the ideals of the spirit of Lausanne – humility in service, dedication to prayer and faithful study of God’s Word – undergirded by unity and partnership that reflects the hope of the gospel.

At the recent Third Lausanne Congress on World Evangelization: Cape Town 2010, more than 4,000 Christian leaders, representing 198 countries, came together to address the major issues facing the global body of Christ.  A global leadership team from South Africa, Zimbabwe, Egypt, Malaysia, India, Brazil, Australia, UK, USA and elsewhere directed the selection of participants, the development of the program and logistics.

Thousands more leaders participated in the Congress through the Cape Town GlobaLink which had 647 registered sites in 97 countries.  Those sites included seminaries, Bible schools, churches and ministries.  The Lausanne Global Conversation also allowed thousands of individuals worldwide to participate in a multilingual discussion on the Congress by providing access to Advance Papers, videos and online discussions on the key issues before, during and after the Congress.  These two new systems leveraged Internet technology to extend the reach of the Congress beyond Cape Town.

Cape Town 2010 has been called “undoubtedly the most representative body of the evangelical church ever assembled . . .  of all church congresses, evangelical or not, at any time in history, it most closely approximates the demographic reality of Christian populations around the world.” (ChristianityToday.com, 20 October 2010)

Cape Town 2010 provided the Church with a(n):

• Ringing affirmation of the truth of Jesus Christ;
• Clear statement on Christian witness among people of other faiths;
• Re-focused emphasis on evangelism and the integral mission of the Church;
• Clarion call to eradicate Bible poverty;
• Appeal to Christian leaders to live a life of humility, integrity and simplicity; and
• Challenge to form new collaborative initiatives and partnerships.

The Cape Town Commitment (CTC), issued out of the Congress, stands in the historic line of The Lausanne Covenant (1974) and Manila Manifesto (1989).  The Commitment, resulting from a three year consultation process involving hundreds of Christian leaders around the world, identified the issues that were discussed at the Congress and later emphasized in the document.  Framed in the language of love, The Cape Town Commitment is a profoundly elegant and biblical affirmation of evangelical faith and provides a call to action on world evangelization that will guide Lausanne’s work for the coming decade.

Event To Movement

Cape Town 2010 was an historic event that helped focus the Church worldwide on the issues and challenges facing the holistic gospel of Jesus Christ.  While the Congress produced The Cape Town Commitment, the work of Lausanne did not end.  In many ways, the task is just beginning and Lausanne’s role has moved from preparing for a major event to helping implement the calls to action in the CTC.

What outcomes from the Congress will be realized in the next ten years? 

Ultimately the responsibility for implementing the CTC is held by the body of Christ and the movement of the Spirit within that body.  However, the Lord is allowing Lausanne to play a significant role as a Movement in helping facilitate the CTC calls to action.

That means that Lausanne is now structuring itself much more as a facilitating Movement and less of an event planning Movement.  Since Cape Town 2010, Lausanne has been putting in place the infrastructure needed to support the ideals and commitments contained in the CTC.  This is repositioning Lausanne from an event-focused organization to an appropriately scaled Movement with the governance and staffing structures needed to sustain organic collaboration on world evangelization.

After much prayer and counsel the Lausanne Board has made several modifications which we pray and believe will allow Lausanne to move purposefully into the coming decade with an even greater degree of transparency and accountability:

• Board of Directors
  • The minimal requirement for any governing Board is to ensure compliance with fiduciary and legal obligations and good stewardship of the resources entrusted to it.  For Lausanne that includes the requirements that come from being recognized as a 501(c)(3) charitable organization in the United States.  Additionally, the Lausanne Board is guiding the Movement to build on what happened at Cape Town 2010.
  • Ram Gidoomal was elected as Chairman of the Lausanne Board of Directors.  Doug Birdsall serves as Executive Chairman of the Movement.  Several leaders have also been added to the Board, including new Vice Chairs from Egypt and India.
  • Other changes include new by-laws and the establishment of a statutory Audit Committee and a Finance Committee.
• International Advisory Council
  • Lausanne is establishing a 50-75 member International Advisory Council.  This globally representative body will include men and women who represent every aspect of the ministry of the Church and bring diversity in age, geography and ethnicity.  Bringing a new global breadth, depth and weight of representation to Lausanne, this council will ensure we move forward intentionally in the task of world evangelization.

Moving Forward

Using The Cape Town Commitment as the guide for the coming decade allows Lausanne to focus its efforts on the integral mission of the Church – holistic evangelism.  The 33 calls to action sounded in The Cape Town Commitment will inspire and guide targeted collaboration— at local, regional and global levels.  Central to those efforts are the following activities:

• Connecting: linking like-minded leaders
  • Lausanne is developing a unified database, with appropriate support systems.
  • This will enhance the ability of leaders to exchange contact information and for Lausanne to have regular communication with leaders for the purposes of collaboration and partnership.
• Convening: bringing thoughtful leaders together
  • Lausanne’s trusted global leadership, proven track record of past gatherings and vision for the future has placed it in a unique position to provide a place for leaders to thoughtfully and constructively engage in praying, planning and working together to further the kingdom of God by pursuing the CTC topics.
  • Mats Tunehag, Lausanne Senior Associate for Business as Mission, is leading the effort to hold a Business as Mission Think Tank, beginning this year and concluding in 2013.
  • Future Lausanne consultations will be held:
    • Regionally – hosted by the Lausanne International Deputy Directors in each of the 12 regions of the world.
    • Issue based – on the CTC topics such as Islam, media, creation care, etc. to provide current information and action on these topics.
  • Under the banner of the Lausanne GlobaLink and The Lausanne Global Conversation, the Movement is seeking ways to better use technology to connect and convene global leaders in the task of global evangelization.
  • Lausanne is also developing event management systems and infrastructure that will provide the needed support for convening leaders.
• Communicating: providing timely, relevant information
  • Lausanne provides regular print, email, Internet and social media communication that shares the latest ideas on the CTC and world evangelization.
    • Lausanne Global Analysis (LGA)
      • The LGA will provide strategic and credible information, commentary and insight from an international network of evangelical analysts so that global Christian leaders will be equipped to address the issues impacting world evangelization.  (pending funding) 
      • Under the guidance of Lausanne and around the common cause of Christ, the LGA would be written by teams of evangelical Christian researchers in research centers around the world to explain socio-cultural, political, economic and religious events globally along with the analysis of how these events and actions impact the body of Christ and the spread of the gospel.
      • This effort builds on the important networking and convening of Lausanne’s Researcher’s Network and offers a way for researchers to share data and ideas in a place of mutual respect and confidentiality.
    • Lausanne Regional Communications Managers (RCMs)
      • Twelve men and women will support Lausanne by developing an interconnected communications infrastructure between the Movement and each of the regions of the world.  (pending funding)
      • Their duties will be to increase awareness about global mission and evangelization issues and Lausanne within each region and generate regional stories and articles to share with the world.
      • The RCMs will serve as part of the Lausanne Communications Team and also provide communications support to the Lausanne International Deputy Directors.
    • Lausanne Website (lausanne.org)
      • The website provides the most comprehensive and substantial collection of information and resources from Lausanne including its history and future and materials such as papers, books and videos produced from gatherings.
      • The website also offers ways for leaders to connect with other like-minded leaders.
      • Lausanne is increasing access to non-English content online through native-speaker translation and automated translation of materials and the development of regionally-hosted language-specific websites.  (pending funding)
    • Lausanne Global Conversation (LGC, lausanne.org/conversation)
      • Initiated before Cape Town 2010 as an Internet-based forum on the Congress issues, the LGC continues today as a place where missional leaders (globally and locally) convene and connect around the CTC through online discussions and sharing resources.
      • The LGC is centered on the issues highlighted in the CTC.
    • Monthly ENewsletter
      • Lausanne provides regular monthly enewsletters that offer information on the CTC, missions and evangelism and the activities of Lausanne.
    • Social Media
      • Lausanne has an active social media presence through our blog, Facebook and Twitter.
      • These tools are used to share news and links on the CTC as well as other information about mission and evangelization.
    • Publication Projects (some projects pending funding)
      • The Cape Town Commitment is now being printed in more than 20 languages and a companion study guide is being edited.
      • Publications will include selected articles and transcripts from the Congress.
      • An Ephesians study guide and DVD/print project is also being developed.
      • A new series of booklets based on the CTC issues consultations (mentioned earlier) is being considered.
• Catalyzing: moving from talk to action
  • Leadership reorganization
    • Lausanne Senior Associate and Special Interest Committee positions are being reorganized while other positions are being identified and filled based on the CTC to ensure active engagement around each of the Commitments.
  • Lausanne International Deputy Directors (IDDs)
    • Lausanne has appointed seven new IDDs, bringing the number of IDDs to 11 (one appointment is pending in Europe).  Each IDD has responsibility for their particular region and seeks to bring leadership, vision, networking and general oversight with regard to world evangelization.
    • The IDDs are volunteers and have a primary ministry alongside of Lausanne responsibilities.
  • Diaspora Mission
    • During Cape Town 2010, The Lausanne Global Diaspora Network was formed.  Under the leadership of Sadiri Joy Tira, Lausanne Senior Associate for the Diaspora, this group exists to motivate and mobilize the Church to reach the Diaspora for Christ and to mobilize Christians in the Diaspora to reach their host nations.
    • This group is laying foundations, through a series of regional consultations, for a Diaspora Missions/Missiology Forum in Manila in 2015.
  • Lausanne Standards
    • Rob Martin, Lausanne Senior Associate for Stewardship, is seeking to make better known The Lausanne Standards, a set of affirmations and agreements for effective giving and receiving of money in mission.
    • Coming out of Cape Town 2010, more than 30 ministries and groups have committed to using the Standards.
  • Global Generosity Declaration
    • The Lausanne Resource Mobilization Working Group, chaired by Ram Gidoomal, has initiated an interactive discussion on global generosity using The Lausanne Global Conversation.  Moderators will write regular blogs and facilitate discussions to encourage thinking about possible solutions to increasing Christian giving globally.
    • This group has developed the Generosity Declaration which it hopes will be used widely by Christians around the world to encourage biblical stewardship.
  • Cape Town Commitment Curricula
    • Evvy Campbell, Lausanne Senior Associate of Holistic Mission, is chairing a task force to prepare an MA level curriculum introducing The Cape Town Commitment to graduate students.  A sub-team is developing a parallel small group curriculum for use in churches and workplaces.
    • This initiative will increase awareness of the issues raised in the CTC and, God willing, inspire strategic action on those issues.
  • “Davos-like” meeting (proposed 2013)
    • Five-hundred carefully selected participants will come together for a peer-to-peer gathering of thought leaders, pastors, mission leaders, government and business executives who share a commitment to world evangelization.
    • The meeting will measure progress in world evangelization since Cape Town 2010 using the priorities articulated by the CTC and assess the major changes in the world of ideas, politics, religion and economics.
  • GlobaLink
    • Over 600 seminaries, Christian colleges, churches, and ministries registered to participate as remote Globalink sites for Cape Town 2010.  These virtual sites allowed institutions to collaborate together on the Congress topics.  Using the principles and technologies developed for GlobaLink, Lausanne will continue to create platforms for collaboration and interconnection of institutions and groups.
    • Lawrence Russell, director of GlobaLink for the Congress, will continue with the next stage of development of the GlobaLink concept.  He along with a core GlobaLink Leadership Team will interact closely with the Lausanne Communications team to develop platforms for institutions to come together for dialogue and potential partnership.  Two prototype GlobaLink events are being planned for 2012.
  • Younger Leaders Gathering

• About 25% of those attending Cape Town 2010 were under the age of 40. These younger leaders (and others who could not attend the event) will be the next generation of leadership. Lausanne is committed to engaging and connecting younger leaders and helping ignite within them a strong passion for world evangelization.
• A Younger Leader Team, representing each of the 12 regions of Lausanne, will convene virtually each month to pray, plan and collaborate.
• Regional Younger Leaders Gatherings will be held, beginning with three in 2012.
• Early stage planning has started for a Younger Leaders Gathering in 2015.

Throughout its nearly 40 year history, Lausanne has remained structurally lean.  The majority of those involved in Lausanne are volunteers – Board members, Senior Associates, Working Group Chairs, etc. – who serve as leaders within the Movement in addition to their other responsibilities in churches, ministries, seminaries, higher education, businesses, government and media.  The Lausanne Senior Associates and the Special Interest Committees Chairs are designing new ways to catalyze collaboration between each other and their networks and in relation to the International Deputy Directors and Working Groups.  They are aligning their initiatives with the calls to action in the CTC and are broadening their leadership teams and networks for even greater global reach and effectiveness.

Lausanne’s small staff serves the Movement by providing the necessary operational support to move forward the top priorities (catalyzing collaboration, communications, leadership development) while also being attentive to the day-to-day details that sustain momentum.

At a moment in history when the Church is dealing with unanticipated global challenges and with unprecedented opportunity for bearing witness to the power of the gospel, it is a sign of hope to see fresh vision, new expressions of unity and a rising generation of leaders come together in The Lausanne Movement with renewed passion for “the whole church to take the whole gospel to the whole world.”

This article was published as part of the Anniversary reflections one year after Cape Town 2010: The Third Lausanne Congress on World Evangelization.