PHILIPPINES
The Philippines is a Southeast Asian country, comprised of more than 7,641 islands and where 115 million people live. The total land area if you squeezed all the islands together would be the size of the state of Arizona. The Philippines has the 5th largest coastline in the world with a total of 22,549 miles.
The capital, Manila is one of the world’s most densely populated cities on earth with 111,000 people per square mile. 30 million people live in the Metro Manila area.
37% or approximately 10 million of these people in Metro Manila live in one of the 560 slums where people exist on $1 to $2 per day. The 560 slums differ in size, from 500 to 1,000 families or more. There is one slum that has a population of 1 million.
360Serve supports church planters serving the poor in these slums who have a goal to start house churches in each of the 560 slums.
The slums themselves are a big challenge. Slums arise because there is not enough housing and employment.
Slums are characterized by poverty, hopelessness, disease, danger, hunger, substance abuse, physical abuse, sexual abuse, teenage pregnancy, lack of education, despair and even suicide.
The majority of the slums have no church and there is unawareness of Jesus.
Support a Filipino Church Planting Pastor
These church planters are joyful and very dedicated people. In this meeting I asked the church planters how I could pray for them. In response, one of the most common prayer requests they had was, “Please pray for God to keep us from sickness.” I asked, “How many of you have gotten seriously sick from serving in the slums?” All of their hands went up. They get Tuberculosis, Encephalitis, Hepatitis and other diseases. They go into these slums knowing it’s just a matter of time before they come down with one of these diseases. They believe Jesus became poor that we might become rich. They are willing to become sick so others can know Jesus.
Most of these church planters have planted 4-6 churches. Many of them came to know Christ in the slums. All of these church planters are highly trained and qualified, but they are also very poor themselves. I was humbled by their incredible willingness to sacrifice even their health to serve Jesus and advance his gospel. The average church planter will plant a church every two years. They go door to door in the slums talking to and befriending the people. When they earn the right to share the gospel with people, 80% of those they share the gospel with accept Christ as their Savior and Lord.