By SP, A SEND team member of Diaspora |North America
When we launched the SEND Diaspora team in this area in 2019, we joined hands with a network of workers who had been serving the Arabic speaking community here for several years, starting Discovery Bible Study (DBS) groups, and had seen several people from Muslim backgrounds come to faith and be baptized. There was no organized church, but several who would meet for DBS a couple times a month.
The SEND team encouraged this group to form a church of these young believers, and those who were serving among them, as we see church planting among these least reached groups as our mandate as a team in line with SEND’s vision. This group began to meet regularly, and a formal “launch” was celebrated by the larger church network of which this church is a part. This church has grown and has become multicultural and multilingual, including Muslim background people from the Middle East and Central and Southern Asia. Several Muslim background believers who have been in the area longer have joined this fellowship as they sense a common heritage with the younger believers of the church.
To accommodate the different cultural and language groups, a typical gathering includes worship in English, with Arabic and occasionally Turkish, Uzbek, or Russian lyrics. Teaching sessions are translated into Arabic for the native Arabic speakers present. Breakout groups follow worship. Groups form at tables based on the common languages of those present, and the DBS model is applied as groups study the Word.
The SEND team devotes our work to welcoming new families from Muslim backgrounds who are resettling in this area. We introduce these families to the new church at special celebrations and trust God to draw new neighbors into this local fellowship, and into His kingdom. We also serve actively in the new church, teaching children and in ministry to adults, as we contribute to the work of making disciples among these Muslim background groups.
We are learning that multicultural church fellowships are being used by God in this time of unprecedented global migration to draw in those who share a common faith tradition and background even when they come out of different cultures and languages.
As younger believers from Muslim backgrounds teach from their experience, God brings his truth in relevant ways to others that understand a Muslim worldview. Currently, the fellowship has around a dozen Muslim background believers and at least that many others who have experience serving in Muslim contexts internationally and/or locally.
