Mere Missions

T he H oly S pirit : E mpower • 97

to the same Evangel Dean Training school those leaders had attended last year. The first team, made up of four leaders, would go on to focus their church planting efforts in Bangladesh, and the second team would stay to reach the Bengali in the U. S. and Canada. In 2019, I invited Pastor Joseph to the March Evangel Gathering in Wichita. (The Evangel Gathering is an annual convening event facilitated by the Evangel Network. The Evangel Network “dynamically catalyzes movements for health and multiplication.”) Being with other church plant movement leaders greatly encouraged and inspired Joseph. It was here that he made plans for the Oklahoma Bengali leadership to attend the August Evangel Dean School. That spring, Joseph traveled to Bangladesh again with fellow Evangel Deans from his congregation to facilitate church plant trainings. One training was held in South Bangladesh with about twenty-five local pastors. The other training was in North Bangladesh and was geared for church planters. Back in America, two more Bengali teams attended at yet another Evangel Dean School, one of whom was Alfred Biswas, from Oklahoma. We were working hard to ensure the Bengali Christians had what they needed to spread the Gospel and plant more churches without financial strain. With the President of World Impact, Dr. Alvin Sanders, and myself, we secured a grant from the Finishing Fund to reach two “Unreached People Groups” in Bangladesh. Pastor Joseph was the connection to lead me to work with Samuel Bala, our contact person in Bangladesh. The September of 2019, Alfred Biswas, now an Evangel Dean, sent me an email to give an update about his work in Bangladesh: “Greetings from Bangladesh! I am happy to inform you that we have planted another new church. This is fully MBB (Muslim Background Believers) church.”