Your Invitation To Run To The Finish Line! Join Us!
Dear Visionary Leader,
Nothing beats a 4×100-meter relay, whether it’s the sprint relay in track or the medley relay in swimming. There is simply no race that translates better to television, offers the same level of naturally baked-in drama, and simultaneously unites a country quite like the 4×100.
It’s better than the blinkless 100-meter sprint, the grinding 800-meter run, and the 400-meter individual medley in swimming. Even track’s 4×400-meter relay and swimming’s 4×100-meter freestyle, both of which come in a close second, nevertheless fall short. The 4×100 wins out every time!
We are living in the greatest moments in the history of the Church. We have the God-give opportunity to seize “these moments” of time and to finish the race toward the finish line of the Great Commission! It is our moment!
For more than two years, we synergized and networked throughout the Body of Christ. Dr. Jame O. Davis, Cofounder/President of the Billion Soul Network, and key leaders of major denominations/fellowships traversed the planet during this period of time to pull together the finest leaders from every world region for the Wittenberg 2017 Congress. More than 600 leaders joined their faith and their forces to focus on FINISH: Find, Intercede, Network, Invest, Send and Harvest. We are now bolting out of our old cinder blocks of thinking and racing toward the finish line by 2030! We can do it, if we will do it together!
During the Wittenberg 2017 Congress, Christian leaders gathered from the globe at Castle Church, in Wittenberg, Germany, for our final session. During this final session, life-changing presentations were given by Jan von Campenhausen, President of the Wittenberg Foundation, Leonard Sweet, President of Spirit-Venture Ministries and renown author, James O. Davis, Founder/President of Global Church Network and Kenneth Ulmer, Senior Pastor of Faithful Central Bible Church (USA). At the close of this final session, Timothy Hill led all the delegates in The Finish Declaration. The Finish Declaration is below:
As a part of the Body of Christ, representing different church organizations, from different groups of believers from every world region, we come together to make the following commitments to FINISH the Great Commission.
We commit to FIND the rest of the unengaged, unreached people groups around the world and to engage them through denominational and organizational platforms for the purposes of cultural understanding, missional strategies, Bible translation, evangelism, church planting and discipleship. We will strive to have a Bible in every language and a missionary presence in the remaining 3000 unengaged, unreached people groups by 2030!
We commit to INTERCEDE throughout the entire Body of Christ for harmony in the Church, humility before Christ, healing of the sick and harvest of the lost. We will study ourselves to death and pray ourselves back to life again! We will pray to know our part in God’s heart and our role in God’s goal. We will ask our Lord to send a sweeping, weeping, reaping revival like this world has never witnessed before!
We commit to NETWORK for the synergizing and mobilizing the entire Body of Christ toward the fulfillment of the Great Commission. Even though we have may have come from different streams of Christianity, we recognize all of us are in the mighty river of salvation today! We pledge to not allow our egos and logos to stop us from tying relational knots for global impact throughout the Global Church and to the ends of the earth!
We commit to INVEST our time, thoughts, talents, temples and treasures into unengaged, unreached people groups and into the Kingdom of God worldwide. We choose to not duplicate the efforts of our fellow-servants and spend our God-given resources wisely. We will encourage Christ-followers everywhere to move from criticizing to complementing, from complaining to connecting and from competing with each other to completing Great Commission together. We do not care who gets the credit as long as God gets the glory!
We commit to SEND missionaries not only to regions where the Gospel is, but into regions where the Gospel is not in order to consistently move toward the finish line. We will measure our local church’s success not only by seating capacity but by the sending capacity. We have moved from the West going to the Rest to the Best around the world going to the Rest of the world. The mission field has become a mission force!
We commit to HARVEST together until the last person has heard the saving Gospel of Christ. We will motivate our leaders to run toward the finish line and mobilize our churches to grow and go and not to dry and die! We collectively cast vision to the ends of the earth and establish a goal to FINISH by 2030!
Until The Last Person Has Heard,
Dr. James. O. Davis
Cofounder / Billion Soul Network
Cochair / Global Networking
