European Baptist Federation Calls Evangelicals to Mobilise Against Poverty

The European Baptist Federation Council (EBF) has given its endorsement to a global campaign targeted at revitalising evangelical Christians and mobilising them in the fight against poverty.

|TOP|The EBF held its meeting on Sept. 22-25 in Prague, Czech Republic, and gave its overwhelming support for all its member unions, churches and members to support the Micah Challenge.

The Micah Challenge, so-called after the Old Testament Prophet, has the aim to gather churches to be tools in making the United Nations Millennium Goals a reality – with one of its aims to cut poverty by half by 2015.

The European Baptist leaders backed the cause via a resolution that called for global action against poverty. The resolution stated, “Today, the gap between the rich and poor in our world is wider than ever. The lives of vast numbers of people are controlled by global injustices such as poverty, disease, illiteracy and conflict, and the cry of so many is for freedom and justice.”

“Despite the commitment of world leaders to agreed United Nations Millennium Development Goals, including halving global poverty by 2015, the achievement of these goals remains a distant dream, but it doesn’t have to be this way.”

The resolution told all European Baptists “to support the aims of the ‘Micah Challenge’ of deepening Christian engagement with the poor, and challenging world leaders to achieve the Millennium Development Goals.”

The leaders said, “We believe that, through a commitment to prayer giving and a campaigning programme of advocacy work, our biblical mandate is to 'act justly' for those who are poor and marginalised.”

Pressure was also applied to world governments, as the leaders urged them to increase their commitments to aid, debt relief and to create more just trade policies.

|QUOTE|The statement concluded, “As representatives of the European Baptist Federation, we declare our faith that all people everywhere are made in the image of God, and have the right to live in freedom from poverty, injustice and violence.”

Already the General Council of the Baptist World Alliance (BWA) adopted a resolution to support the Micah Challenge last year.

In addition to this further support, the EBF also gave its blessing for three new unions to become members of its body.

The Baptist Swedish mission organisation Interact, with 320 churches and 30,000 members, was accepted as a full member, along with the three-church Union of Baptist Congregations in Kosovo. In addition, the Baptist congregation in the Iraqi capital of Baghdad, with about 100 members, became an associate member.

The EBF Council also heard a report from its Indigenous Missionary Project about successful church plans to take place in Moldova, Armenia and Georgia.

Daniel Trusiewicz, the Polish-born coordinator of the project said, “It's easier for native Christians to win their fellow countrymen for the gospel of Jesus Christ than for foreign missionaries.”

The mission movement was launched in 2003 by four missionaries in Moldova, however, the IMP now involves 40 missionaries working in an area stretching from Russia’s Arctic Circle to the Black Sea.

The long-term vision is to support 200 indigenous missionaries, in close cooperation with national Baptist unions and local congregations.

One of the basic foundations of the movement is for the church planters to develop sufficiently within five years, so that after this initial period they can operate entirely on a self-sufficient basis. This will help focus missionaries, and enable the gospel to spread more rapidly throughout Europe.