The Importance of Vision

Our vision is to see a holistic disciple-making movement
in every urban poor community.

It all started with a vision... Soon after setting up Project HALO for orphans, a very special disciple-making movement was born in the urban poor communities of Cambodia.

I began to share the vision for young Cambodian Christians to mentor one orphan each and the very first group of "Big Brothers and Sisters" was established.

They visit their orphans for encouragement and discipleship on an individual basis each week and also meet regularly as a group for prayer and outings.

Those young Christians have now been Big Brothers and Sisters for about four years and are still going strong. Several of them have gone on to start their own groups at their churches and other churches have also caught the vision. There are now hundreds of Big Brothers and Sisters in Cambodia.

This is a personal example of a disciple-making movement growing because of a clear and compelling vision. Discipleship movements such as Lilok and Onesimo have developed differently and been appropriate for the Philippines. But there are also good examples of pre-discipleship and even pre-evangelism ministries, such as Mark’s land tenure work in Delhi, nutrition and immunization projects in Phnom Penh and the eco-center in Manila that are equally important.

The underlying principle is that whenever a group of people embraces a compelling vision they become focused, energized and confident, and before long others will want to join in. A compelling vision provides clear direction and a sense of purpose. Our five values are extremely important and worthwhile: they provide the framework within which we live and work. But they are not an end or a goal in themselves. We must hold onto these values while seeing together the big picture of where we want to go.

From Craig Greenwood, Discussions on Servants to Asia's Urban Poor Vision.