By Super User on Wednesday, 05 August 2020
Category: News

International Newsletter August 2020

We’re in the midst of a global pandemic, a worldwide economic crisis, and social unrest. There is no reason for hope, as an entire generation of young people are confused and fearful. God's heart breaks and He is calling us to bring the hope and love of Jesus to this lost and broken Global Youth Culture by establishing Steiger City Teams in key global cities all over the world.


What Is a Steiger City Team?

A Steiger City Team mobilizes followers of Jesus to reach young people who would not walk into a church. It is a powerful force for change that can transform an entire city!
We are actively engaged in establishing Steiger City Teams in 101 cities around the world, moving rapidly towards our 2025 vision of 100 Steiger City Teams in 100 key global cities.
These teams develop through four phases. Let’s take a look at one of our teams in each phase, and hear more about the incredible work God is doing through them in reaching global youth!


Phase 1: Pioneering and Partnership
Tampere, Finland

Kouvola team leaders, Sami and Salla, initiate the pioneer work in Tampere

In Phase 1, Steiger begins to actively pioneer and develop partnerships in a city where God is opening up opportunities for us. We start to engage in scouting trips, creating a web of contacts with people and churches that are hungry to see young people in their cities transformed with the message of the Gospel.

A Steiger Phase 1 City Team organizes high-impact evangelistic events such as No Longer Music shows, concerts, movie screenings and discussions, and offers Steiger training events that share the mission’s vision and mobilize people to get involved.

Last year, NLM toured Finland and did a show in the city of Tampere. As a result of this and of our Phase 4 Kouvola City Team’s networking, a number of people from Tampere participated in the Online Compact School. Now, there’s a team of twenty going to the streets weekly to creatively share the Gospel and disciple those who are wanting to go deeper!


Phase 2: Preparation
Denver, USA

Aaron Pierce in Denver, casting the vision for Steiger City Teams

“Entering Phase 2 of the City Team process is all about commitment,” explains JoAnna King from Denver (USA). After a Preach and Teach event in 2019, JoAnna’s church committed to partnering with Steiger to start a City Team in Denver. Now, 18 volunteers from several churches help with the budding team’s outreaches and events!

In this phase of development, a City Team leader has been identified, at least one church partnership has been formed, and team members are being prepared to reach and disciple the global youth of their city. Denver team members are being trained through Steiger’s Online Worldwide Compact School, and have begun outreaches in their city, including a time of listening and conversation in the middle of downtown protests, participating in the National Arts Drive, and more!

JoAnna wants to see God break through the spiritual blindness in Denver, raising up a new generation with a hunger to reach young people outside the Church! 


Phase 3: City Team Start-up
Sumy, Ukraine

Sumy City Team members leading people to Jesus on the streets of their city

Ukraine’s Sumy City Team was officially born in 2019 following a No Longer Music concert. As a Phase 3 City Team, they are receiving two years of focused support from Steiger, aimed at seeing them become a strong, healthy, and self-sustaining team in the mission.

Sumy’s 25 team members and volunteers are implementing Steiger activities like street outreach and local church training, while cultivating Steiger’s values including a culture of seeking God within their team. Their desire is to bridge the gap between global youth and the local Church.

Team member Nastya shares, “During one outreach, I spoke with two girls. The first girl’s father was murdered, and the second never felt love or support from anyone in her life. When I started talking about Jesus, His love, and what He did to save us, the girls started to cry. I offered to pray for them, and we held hands and prayed a salvation prayer together right on the main street of our city! After this outreach, both girls came to our Bible Study. We are currently discipling them - their testimony is amazing!”


Phase 4: Established City Team
Bogotá, Colombia

Alejandro Reyes shares his testimony after a No Longer Music show in Bogotá

In 2017, a Steiger seminar launched our mission in Bogotá and Latin America. Wanting to learn more, Alejandro Reyes and several others from the city came to Germany for the Steiger Missions School. Upon their return to Colombia, three Bogotá Compact Schools, a No Longer Music Tour, and intensive partnering with local churches led to an explosion of growth across the region. Now Bogotá is the center of operations for Steiger Latin America, and the largest City Team within Steiger - counting a total of 119 missionaries, team members, and volunteers.

As a Phase 4 team, they are fully engaged in evangelism, discipleship, and training, while actively investing in new leaders and engaging in pioneering work in new cities.

In the past months, the Online Compact Schools have raised up new leaders and exponentially accelerated growth in Steiger LATAM. The schools have spread Steiger’s vision and made it accessible to many, awakening in them a hunger to be part of urban missions.

Pray for our 101 teams, currently spread out across all four phases of Steiger City Team development! We are beginning to see the Jesus revolution that we have been crying out to God for, birthed in key cities around the world!


Hope for the Global Youth Culture Tour


Young people today see all authority and every religion as inherently oppressive - and they are leaving it all behind. Tragically, in making freedom their god, they have become slaves to it, and the consequences are devastating. 

Without God, an entire generation has been reduced to highly evolved animals, more confused than ever about truth, meaning, and the purpose of life. Young people today are addicted to social media and are trading real relationships for virtual ones leading to a lethal loneliness epidemic, unlike any other time in history. 


Is there any hope for them?


Our heart is to bridge the gap between the Church and the Global Youth Culture. One way we do this is by equipping the local church to proclaim the message of Jesus in the language of global youth, and to engage in ongoing discipleship relationships with them.

The Hope for the Global Youth Culture Tour includes speaking and training events in locations all around the world. For the full schedule visit

steiger.org/hope4GYCtour


 
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