5 Much-Needed Factors in Spirit-Led Marketplace Ministry

That led me to create the International School of Ministry, or ISOM, as it is known. (Pexels)

Growing up in South Africa in the 1960s and '70s hardly prepared me for my current work I do now around the world. God often has unexpected destinies for our lives and mine certainly would fall into that category. Although my father was South African, my mother was the daughter of an American diplomat and that gave me U.S. citizenship and an opportunity to study abroad. In 1980, I entered the University of Michigan, where I studied television and film. A master's degree followed at Regent University in Virginia and my degree in media thrust me for three years alongside Reinhard Bonnke as his television producer. During those years, I documented millions of people making decisions for Jesus Christ but the burning question that dominated my heart was "Who is going to disciple all those new believers?"

That led me to create the International School of Ministry or ISOM as it is known. The concept was simple, find the best Bible teachers in the world, have each teach their distinctive subjects of expertise and video them live in 14 languages. In California, I started with Reinhard and professionally filmed five lessons on power evangelism. Soon, Jack Hayford agreed to do lessons on integrity and forgiveness. Before long we had John Bevere, Brian Houston, Marilyn Hickey and Joyce Meyer. In the end, we recorded 160 sessions of Bible school training from more than 30 well-known teachers and created the ISOM. ISOM has expanded in the past 20 years into 147 nations and into over 70 languages. ISOM is presently the world's largest video Bible school. We currently know of 17,000 training sites that have used the ISOM curriculum to equip their believers for ministry service.

Following ISOM, we created a women's curriculum called Women of the World, then a teen youth video curriculum called YouthBytes, which I developed with Chad Daniel. These were all powerful discipleship programs for growing people in the church and in their personal faith. Then in 2008, I met Lance Wallnau and finally understood the message of the seven mountains of influence.

I immediately flew Lance Wallnau to New York and filmed five sessions with him on the seven mountain Strategy. I knew Lance was on to something but he was lacking the exact strategy of implementation. Since that time I have connected with many networks in the global body of Christ who are taking Lance's principles and are mobilizing Christian business people to become forces for God in the secular marketplace. I realized that the best of these leaders needed to be recorded. Working with Kingdom Congressional International Alliance (KCIA) and Dr. Bruce Cook, we set about during 2015-16 to video over 80 teachings from 60 global business and seven mountain leaders.

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Starting in January of 2017, we are releasing Marketplace Module Volumes 1 and 2 into the body of Christ. Language translation has already begun into about 12 languages and this content is the "how to" of the seven-mountain strategy. What are the key ingredients of this series of teaching? We will cover some of these in detail in the months ahead but they include:

1. Understanding the concept of divine assignment in the seven mountains

2. Ousting Babylon and the spirit of mammon (spirit of greed, fear and corruption) from all of your operations

3. How business can deal a deadly blow to debt, unemployment and social distress

4. How pastors and local churches should relate to business and seven-mountain leaders

5. The true understanding of functioning as a king and priest in the marketplace

There are many more topics, but these will hopefully wet your appetite. Each month through 2017, we will unfold some details of these amazing topics. We designed our training to be practical, versatile and easy to use. For example, a pastor can run the program for the business leaders in the local church. We are strong believers in local church training, but shepherding business leaders requires content like this to make the experience dynamic and relevant.

Billy Graham said the last major revival was going to happen in the marketplace. Let's get ready for this to happen.

Dr. Berin Gilfillan is graduate of Regent University in Virginia Beach. He was formerly the TV producer for Reinhard Bonnke. He is the creator of the International School of Ministry (ISOM), which is the world's largest video Bible school with over 17,000 training sites around the world. More information can be found at isom.org

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