In January 1999, under a mango tree in Freedom Park, Dumaguete City, Philippines, several university students gathered and heard a clear presentation of the gospel.
Those students embraced Christ and formed the core of what is known as Student Movement for Christ International (SMCI).
First outreach
Six months later, permission was given to preach the gospel for 20 minutes in every classroom in several universities and campuses. Gospel meetings were also held on campuses in the evening.
This first evangelistic outreach lasted for seven weeks; the gospel was preached 170 times to over 14,000 students with several thousand of these young people placing their trust in Jesus Christ. Over the next few months, discipleship classes were held with many of these new believers.
Today, SMCI is an organised campus ministry. Every week they have the privilege of taking the gospel to 75 universities, colleges and schools throughout the Philippines. Every year this ministry shares Christ with hundreds of thousands of students and several thousand of them attend weekly discipleship classes.
Recent e-Campaign 2018
The annual evangelistic campaign (e-Cam-paign) runs every year during the months of July and August. Each week there are opportunities in different cities of the Philippines, with different teams of people from around the world sharing the gospel. There is the chance for each person to preach the gospel on average of five to six times a day.
This year from 2 July–4 August the e-Cam-paign teams took the gospel to five different locations over five weeks, reaching 351 schools. The gospel was preached 3,617 times to 172,333 young people and 79,295 people made decisions for Christ. Nearly 500,000 gospel tracts were distributed to the students and 10,000 gospel booklets to teachers and principals. In previous years with larger teams, over 300,000 students have been reached. Praise God. Since 2000, SCMI has had the joy of preaching the gospel to over 8.5 million young people in the Philippines.
‘The thought never left me.’
Ray Chong, from Guildford, said: ‘I was aware of SMCI while attending church in Singapore, when I moved from the UK in 2008 to start my employment there. I was unable to participate in any of the e-Cam-paigns due to work and family commitments. If I thought I would never go, God had a different plan.
‘When we returned to the UK in 2015, the thought of going to the Philippines never left me. The urge to go increased and so this year I decided to make this outreach trip. Instead of going alone I encouraged a friend, Beng Hock, to join me. To my surprise, he agreed to go. As the time drew near I started to get nervous about how to share the gospel in 15-20 minutes to a classroom of 40-60 students. Even though the first two sessions were nerve-racking, praise the Lord, he gives me the confidence to carry on. By the fourth day, I was sharing in five classes to over 200 students and to 800 students over four days. It was a joy and privilege to do this, especially when some of the students prayed to accept Christ into their lives.’
Challenged again
Beng Hock said: ‘Ray challenged me a few years ago that we should participate in an e-Campaign to experience the amazing work of God in the Philippines. When I visited him in UK last year that the challenge was brought up again and we agreed that we should join the 2018 e-Campaign. Still, I was uncertain and nervous on how to reach out to the students with the gospel. I had tried street evangelism once, many years ago, but without any apparent “success”.
‘Prior to the trip, a veteran e-Campaigner gave me some tips on speaking to the students. Nevertheless, it was when we saw how the accompanying pastors preach the gospel that I started to grasp the gist of presenting the gospel and what it meant when God says we are merely his mouthpiece. I was thankful and elated that on my first attempt, by the grace of God, everyone in the class raised their hands to confess their sins and follow Christ as their personal Lord and Saviour! How great is the power of the cross and the Word as it seemed I was just reciting John 3.16 to class after class!’
Christians need to make the most of the available time, for lives are at stake.
