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Our Goals

SEND Taiwan seeks, through partnering, to establish a sufficient number of multiplying churches to fully evangelize each of the three major Han Chinese people groups in Taiwan and to significantly contribute to making disciples of all nations. To see this accomplished, SEND International of Taiwan works in cooperation with the national church in Taiwan, planting and establishing reproducing churches.

Our goals for the period of 1999 to 2002:

• To develop creative partnerships and relationships with the national church to plant reproducing churches. This may include commitment of personnel to specialized ministries such as pre-evangelism, evangelism, and leadership development.
• To see a sending committee functioning and the first career missionary sent.
• To encourage the vision of, and to facilitate the preparation and orientation of, mission personnel for ministries in East Asia for assignment in these ministries when appropriate.
• To partner with the national church in pastoral and church leadership development.
• To nurture the cross-cultural missionary vision of the national church by cultivating ministries to Overseas Contract Workers (OCWs) in Taiwan.

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Ministry Strategy

Christianity has been in Taiwan for over 100 years, but the people of Taiwan are slow to respond to the gospel. Ancestor worship and idol worship remain strong among the Taiwanese and are closely associated with "being Chinese." As Taiwan has modernized, a new hurdle to faith has developed—materialism. The promise and comforts of material wealth are constantly visible: expensive cars, comfortable homes, mobile phones, computers. People work hard and make great sacrifices to share in this growing national wealth, and little time or interest remains for spiritual things.

In spite of these obstacles, SEND Taiwan has developed several strong arms of ministry opportunity: church planting, seminary partnership, work among overseas contract workers, and "missionary kid" education. In addition, recent difficulties faced by Taiwan have provided new opportunities to introduce people to the true and living God. In September of 1999, a killer earthquake devastated Taiwan and continues to affect the nation’s people today. In early 2000, for the first time in its history Taiwan elected a president who was not from the ruling party. While this was a great step forward for democracy, the economy has been stumbling ever since. In addition, Mainland China continues to press for the reunification of Taiwan with China. All these things create instability, and as a result people are more open to learning about security in Christ.

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Church Planting

• Among the Hakka
  The Hakka people, a distinct ethnic group of Han Chinese, constitute about 14% of Taiwan’s population (three million people)—but only 0.3% of the Hakka population in Taiwan is reputed to be Christian. SEND missionaries are working effectively with the Tsong Tsen Tang Hakka Fellowship (TTT) planting Hakka churches. This fellowship of churches began in 1973 as a single congregation in Taipei, and it has grown to a fellowship of 11 congregations. The immediate vision is to plant four more congregations and to see existing congregations all become self supporting and resource sharing, in order to reach the Hakka people of Taiwan.
  
  

• Among the Taiwanese Grassroots People (Hokkien)
  Han Chinese from Fujian Province of China migrated to Taiwan about 300 years ago. Their language—a dialect most commonly referred to as Hokkien—has been preserved, and its use still identifies this ethnic group. There are about 49 million Hokkien Chinese worldwide. The 14.1 million Hokkien speakers (also called Taiwanese speakers) in Taiwan account for two-thirds of the island’s population. Just over 1% of Hokkien speakers in Taiwan are Christian. SEND has just entered into a partnership with Hokkien Harvest. This is a cooperative group of missions and local churches committed to ignite a church planting movement among the Hokkien-speaking people of Taiwan.
  
  

• Among the Taiwanese New Middle Class
  The New Middle Class of Taiwan is also primarily Hokkien Chinese. However, this class has identified education as a primary value, and Mandarin Chinese is their language of choice. While only about 2% are Christian, this group is among the most responsive to Christianity on the island.

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Seminary Partnership

SEND partners with Tao Sheng Seminary in Taipei. Tao Sheng Seminary’s mission is to train grass-roots church planters for Taiwan and East Asia. Tao Sheng welcomes both Chinese and non-Chinese teachers from SEND. In addition to strengthening the spiritual and academic program at the seminary, missionary instructors can also prepare for teaching opportunities in East Asia that are anticipated for the future.

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Overseas Contract Workers

Over 300,000 foreign workers live in Taiwan. These workers come from many nations including the Philippines, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, Nigeria and Vietnam. SEND’s goal is to nurture the cross-cultural missionary vision of the local churches by cultivating ministries to Overseas Contract Workers (OCWs). These ministries include: networking with churches in workers’ home countries to bring pastors and missionaries to minister to them in Taiwan; evangelism; developing workers’ fellowships; and discipling OCWs to be "missionaries" themselves when they return to their home countries.

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MK Education

Morrison Academy is a K-12 Christian school with three campuses and two satellite schools located throughout Taiwan. SEND partners with Morrison to provide spiritual, academic, social, and emotional nurture for children of missionaries and overseas business personnel stationed in Taiwan.

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Ministry Focus

The Taiwan team includes members from seven nationalities and at least nine distinct ethnic backgrounds. Twelve team members are assigned to church planting teams, two work with Overseas Contract Workers and special ministries, two are assigned to Tao Sheng Seminary, six are in language study, and two have primary assignments in administration.

SEND missionaries are working effectively with the Tsong Tsen Tang Hakka Fellowship (TTT) planting Hakka churches. This fellowship of churches began as a single congregation in Taipei. It has grown to a fellowship of 11 congregations. Some of these are still very small and dependent on resources from the Fellowship and SEND. The short-term goal is to plant four additional congregations.

SEND missionaries are also assigned to individual congregations in central Taiwan. These congregations are committed to establishing daughter churches in nearby, unreached communities.

SEND has just entered into a partnership with Hokkien Harvest. This is a cooperative group of missions and local churches committed to ignite a church planting movement among the Hokkien (Taiwanese) speaking people of Taiwan.

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