Fall 2007 Perspectives Speakers
Thompsons Station and Murfreesboro, TN
Dale Evrist and his wife Joan moved to Nashville from California in 1993 to start New Song Christian Fellowship, a church with a vision of winning the lost, equipping the saints, and planting churches both here and abroad. Since 1993, New Song has planted ten other churches in the greater Nashville area, trained hundreds of evangelists and missionaries in its Life School of Ministry, and sent out missionaries throughout the world. The expansion of the Kingdom of God is Pastor Dale’s biggest passion in life.
Ben McGinnis is pastor of Woodbine Baptist Church in Nashville, TN. Prior to pasturing, he served as a journeyman missionary to Burkina Faso, an extremely poor nation in west Africa, where he worked in a primarily Muslim culture. Since that time, he has felt a calling to work among Muslims and to raise up the American church to reach out to Muslims both here and abroad. He lives in Nashville with his wife and daughter.
Dr Myron Goodwin holds an Mdiv in Cross-Cultural Ministry and a Ph.D. in Education. Myron is VP of strategic planning with International Christian Ministries of Bakersfield, CA, an organization cofounded by him and his wife, Carol. ICM is a team of men and women committed to partnership with national leaders to provide inservice theological education to the church across the continent of Africa. He is still involved with ICM. Myron has spent many years on the field in Israel (12 years), Scotland (1 year) and Kenya (4 years). The Goodwins have four children – all born on the mission field. They live in Franklin, TN.
Dr Suuqiina and Rev Qaumaniq Suuqiina are involved in taking the Gospel to the indigenous peoples of the world as well as building bridges between the indigenous peoples and the majority people in the countries in which they live. The Suuqiinas have done this work in several countries.
Yvonne Huneycutt opened the Nashville Office of the U.S. Center for World Mission in 1995. She serves as a speaker, consultant and resource provider to churches, organizations, and individuals across a wide denominational spectrum. She also facilitates city-wide mission and prayer efforts for Nashville and the world. Yvonne has participated in numerous missions trips around the world and spent 1994 living and ministering in St. Petersburg, Russia. Previous years were spent in church youth ministry, higher education and seven years “fleshing out” the gospel through positions in the computer industry. Yvonne holds a Master of Divinity degree from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas and a Bachelor of Arts from Samford University in Birmingham, Alabama. She is pursuing a doctorate. She and her husband Steve live in Round Rock, Texas.
Dr. David Howard - Former President of the Latin America Mission (LAM), former Director of the World Evangelical Fellowship (WEF) and former Director of the Urbana Inter-Varsity Missions Conference. David studied at Wheaton College, where he roomed with Jim Elliott, who later married his sister Elizabeth. He attended the first Urbana conference back in 1946 where he dedicated his life to the cause of missions. He later directed the 1973 and 1976 conferences. After the 1973 conference, Dr Ralph Winter approached him to develop a follow-up course for the students who made a mission commitment. The course, first offered in 1974 at Wheaton College, later became known as Perspectives.
Jeff Lewis is currently a professor at California Baptist University as well as a consultant to the youth division of the International Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention. Lewis is well known as the author of God’s Heart for the Nations. He is a graduate of the University of Tennessee and Knoxville as well as Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. His vision is American youth becoming world Christians.
Dennis Cochrane – Wycliffe Bible Translators - Dennis Cochrane and his wife, Nancy, served as linguists and Bible translators among the Duna people in the highlands of Papua New Guinea. Dennis is a graduate of Columbia International University and Wheaton Graduate School of Theology. His linguistics studies were done at the University of North Dakota. Before beginning Bible translation work the Cochranes learned the language of the Duna people. They then created an alphabet for this previously unwritten language, did grammar analysis and compiled a Duna-English dictionary.
Bobby Gupta serves as the President & Director of Hindustan Bible Institute & College in Chennai, India. His main assignment is equipping national missionaries for leadership and evangelism for the nation of India; church planting and mobilizing the Church to a vision of discipling the nation through a strategy of saturation church planting. He has a vision of a million churches in India.
Dr. Glen Gibson – Team Expansion – Glen served until recently in the Philippines. He now serves as training coordinator for Team Expansion, a mission sending agency focused on the unreached peoples of the world. This entails overseeing the preparation of both long and short term missionaries to all parts of the world. Glen finished his Ph.D. from Fuller earlier this year. He and his family live in Louisville.
Jerry Trousdale is currently serving as the West African Coordinator for City Team. From 1971 to 1975 Jerry served as a missionary to Sierra Leone with The Church of Christ Mission where he planted three churches and trained non-literate church leaders. From 1997 to 2002 he pastored The Carpenter’s House in Murfreesboro, Tennessee. Jerry is conversational in the Mende and Krio languages and has studied Latin, Greek, French, and German. He has almost completed a doctorate in missiology from Fuller Seminary. Jerry splits his time between West Africa and Murfreesboro, Tennessee where he lives with his wife Gail.
Alfred and Jean McCroskey started Bibles for Russia in 1985 after being caught at the border smuggling Bibles into Russia. After the wall came down and doors opened, smuggling was no longer necessary. Bibles For Russia teams could visit homes, hospitals, prisons, military institutions, orphanages and, yes, even public schools. They did tract distribution and evangelism. They distributed humanitarian aid (food, medicine, clothes), and conducted seminars. Through a "Sister Church" program begun by the McCroskey's, over 1000 churches have been "planted" in 9 nations of the former Soviet Union, including predominately Muslim areas and other "unreached peoples" of Siberia. Some of those congregations also got the "missions vision" and have themselves started churches and missionary organizations.
Mike Pollard – Arab World Ministries - Mike Pollard is the Director of Church Relations for the U.S. office of Arab World Ministries. He has also served as a missions pastor. Mike has founded the Nashville Mission Leaders Conference, a group of church mission leaders who meet monthly to share experiences and mentor each other.