Greetings. In January 2024, I stepped into the new Director for Global Collaboration role for the OC Global Alliance.  For the past twenty years, I have served in the OCGA, first as a missionary in southern Africa and then as the Executive Director of Outreach Canada.  I have also been privileged to serve several terms on the OCGA Guidance Team.

History - Our seventy-four-year history began with sending our first missionaries from America to Formosa in 1950.  Our original board of directors included Charles Culver (Oriental Mission Society), Billy Graham (Billy Graham Evangelistic Association), Bob Jones (Bob Jones University), Clyde Taylor (National Association of Evangelicals), Dawson Trotman (The Navigators,) and others.  This visionary group launched a new mission to focus on evangelism, discipleship, and the development of local church leaders. Through the years, we have grown and expanded into other countries. In 2008, we had over 700 missionaries serving globally, and over half were nationals from the countries where we served.  In 2010, One Challenge International released our largest teams worldwide to become independent partners, thus creating a polycentric model that accelerated our ability to recruit, train, and deploy new missionaries worldwide.  Last year, we had over 1,200 personnel serving in 96 nations worldwide.

Recognition - Recognizing the growing centrifugal force generated in a poly-centric mission organization over time and responding to requests of our partners, the OCGA Collaboration Hub was launched on January 1, 2024, to encourage and facilitate more vital collaboration, communication, and coordination within our OC Global Alliance, to strengthen our unity and ability to work effectively together to develop leaders, multiply churches, and disciple all nations.  This new international “Hub” helps connect our teams worldwide and makes our support and resources available to everyone. This enables us to be more strategic and practical in recruiting global workers and serving our existing workers for maximum ministry effectiveness.

Response - Launching the Collaboration Hub also entails recruiting and training an international team that works interdependently and virtually. Team members bring expertise and experience from different regions to form a gravitational center for our polycentric partnership. This team serves as custodians of our internal and external relationships and forms vital bonds for communication and collaboration between our teams and fields.

Rally - The Collaboration Hub will host annual regional summits to draw together our workers in different regions and around specific ministry foci to promote learning, development, research, relationships, recruiting, and ministry collaboration. (Examples: North American Ministry Forum, DMM Working Group, Greater China Forum, Member Care Seminar, Latin American Ministry Forum, etc.)  We hope to build toward a global gathering of our team leaders and ministry personnel in 2028.

The Hub is now in its seventh month of development and is already seeing great progress.  We appreciate your prayers and support as we work toward the following outcomes.

Collaboration—The OCGA flourishes with effective collaboration at all levels and through our various thematic and resource teams.

Communication – The OCGA functions with strong relationships and ministry awareness through an effective and efficient communication strategy.

Coaching—OCGA leaders and personnel have access to an integrated coaching network that helps develop individuals in leadership, ministry, and personal competency.

Celebration – The OCGA recognizes and celebrates God’s work worldwide through our teams and partnerships.

Challenge – Strong relationships among OCGA leaders who lean on one another for support and to challenge each other in innovation and vision casting.

Coordination – OCGA leaders and teams know and have ready access to our various resources, teams, and crisis response resources.

I look forward to sharing about our Alliance, our ministries, and our progress toward these outcomes in this new monthly director's blog in the months and years to come.