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More than 10 million people in Texas do not speak English at home, according to the latest census. That makes English as a Second Language ministries incredibly useful tools for churches to reach them for Christ.
“The nations are our neighbors,” said Del Traffanstedt, pastor of Cross Community Church in Northeast Houston. “… If the nations are here, and we’re to fulfill the Great Commission, then we can start reaching those language groups now.”
Traffanstedt and his wife, Charmaine, researched their community before planting Cross Community and determined that people needed to advance in the workplace, assimilate into the community, and operate in the economy.
“For all of those things, English seemed like the best bridge,” Del said. “We wanted to do that in a very gospel-forward way.”
Since the Traffanstedts had served previously as ESL teachers, that became a reasonable way to reach the vast numbers of immigrants from Central and South America who had settled in Houston.
With the help of a trainer from the North American Mission Board, an ESL ministry at Cross Community started about four years ago with 12 students. It has grown to more than 60.
“That started to feed into church growth,” Del said. “Probably a third of our members come from our ESL ministry. We baptized many. Some are in leadership now in the church.”
The Traffanstedts are careful not to call ESL a program. They call it a ministry because programs tend to be about content and services. Ministries, he noted, are different because they focus on individuals.
“We knew training was important both in terms of staying tightly knit to it being a ministry of the church that’s a very intentional outreach for sharing the gospel ...”
Churches investing in one another
A priority for starting the ESL ministry at Cross Community was to do it well and tie it to the gospel, so the Traffanstedts made sure church leaders participated in the initial training offered by NAMB.
“We knew training was important both in terms of staying tightly knit to it being a ministry of the church that’s a very intentional outreach for sharing the gospel, but then also ongoing training to make sure we’re doing what we say we’re going to do well,” Charmaine said.
As Cross Community’s ESL ministry grew, the door opened for Charmaine to train Southern Baptists of Texas Convention churches in ESL. Now she views that service as an investment back into the entities that have invested in Cross Community—the SBTC and NAMB.
Each summer at the SBTC’s Equip Conference, five to 10 churches are trained in ESL, Charmaine said, and she trains individual churches throughout the year. Earlier this year, a training was held at Lavon Drive Baptist Church in Garland with three churches of various sizes represented.
“We had the opportunity then to have a smaller church investing into a larger church while at the same time having a larger church invest into smaller churches,” she said.
Charmaine is ESL-certified through NAMB and also has a master’s degree in teaching English to speakers of other languages, so she does the primary training at sessions. Del teaches how to share the gospel using a believer’s testimony and leads a module on what pastors can expect.
“We start from the very beginning of establishing a ministry from scratch, so everything from the administrative pieces that go along with that to being able to market it to the community,” Charmine said.
The training covers teaching techniques, cultural differences, and cross-cultural communication. “Then we look at incorporating biblical materials into the lesson plans on a regular basis,” she said, “… to help people understand who Jesus Christ is and their need for a relationship with Him.”
A ministry any church can do
One of the common concerns Del hears from pastors is that they don’t know the language of the people they’re trying to reach. The ministry is to teach people English, though, so knowledge of their heart language is not necessary.
Also, people who would attend classes may be from multiple language backgrounds, so it would be unlikely that any one ministry would be able to speak every language represented.
“With the majority of communication being nonverbal, you can start to establish a relationship with another person even before you can speak each other’s languages because actions matter,” Del said.
Once churches start ESL ministries, excitement quickly catches on, he said. “It is something you almost have to walk through before you can completely grasp it.”
ESL is a good opportunity for churches to think outside their own walls and focus on kingdom advancement rather than just growing their individual churches, Charmaine said.
For instance, if a church finds through ESL that a new believer would be discipled best in his or her heart language, the church may be able to find a nearby Southern Baptist church that worships in that language.
“Understanding the importance of cooperating with one another to advance the kingdom and not just viewing these outreach ministries as a means to grow our own churches I think is very important because it puts it all in alignment with the Great Commission,” Charmaine said.
For more information about starting an ESL ministry in your church, contact Rebecca Burk in the SBTC’s Missional Ministries department at rburk@sbtexas.com.
