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The GGF, Three Years On

20/11/2024

What is the EMF 'GGF'? Field Director Andrew Birch explains.

It's our Gospel Growth Fund, created in January 2022 to make it as easy as possible for people to support our ‘Lighting up the Darkness’ initiative, which was being launched at that time. 

Why ‘Lighting up the Darkness’? Given the desperate situation in the world's (spiritually) neediest continent, we wanted to be able to support more gospel work, particularly new gospel workers engaged in new gospel work in especially needy places.

We were particularly concerned about the Balkans and the Nordics – two very different regions, but with three important characteristics in common: very few genuinely Bible-believing churches; plenty of religious options, but very few gospel churches; and very few EMF missionaries!

We had no intention of abandoning the rest of Europe: money donated to our Gospel Growth Fund could be used to support gospel workers in any European country, as long as they were new workers doing new work in new places. The emphasis would be on the planting and nurturing of new churches, but we were also open to helping struggling churches in urgent need of revitalisation.

We set ourselves a modest target: to take on 15 Gospel Growth Fund missionaries (or missionary couples)over the course of a five-year period (from the beginning of 2022 to the end of 2026).

So as we approach the 60% mark (three years out of five), how are things going? The short answer is that at the time of writing, we have 11 Gospel Growth Fund missionaries / missionary couples:

Bruno and Sara Pires(Portugal)

Diego and Stella Lopes(Portugal)

Eelis and Manna Halmemies(Finland)

Iliya and Christina Marinov(Bulgaria)

João and Ana Cid (Portugal)

Manuel and Jania Morelli(Italy)

Martin Hjellvik (Norway)

Paulo and Patrícia Carvalho (Portugal)

Rafael and Lidiane Ribas (Portugal)

Samuel and Tuuli Gandi(Finland)

Tobias and Julie Haslund-Thomsen (Denmark)

A few explanatory comments are necessary: Bruno and Sara Pires may be moving soon to a different ministry situation; Samuel Gandi is currently doing a pastoral apprenticeship, with a view to being part of a church-planting team in the future; and Romuald and Liz Lasnes (not on the above list) are key members of a team aiming to plant a church in the 11th District of Paris.

So, while we haven't yet reached our five-year target, as you can see we're ahead of schedule.  And – what's far more important than EMF's particular concerns and aims – we are seeing dying churches being revitalised, new churches being planted and nurtured, and the gospel reaching places and people previously without any clear gospel light.

We are thankful to the Lord for guiding us to the right people and enabling us to support them, and we're grateful to the many churches and individuals who, through their generous giving, have helped to make all of this possible.

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