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The name starts with 'Philippine' because this ministry is aimed at helping Filipinos and because the main people doing the help are Filipino Senior pastors. It has been requested that it be expanded to helping ministries in other countries but trying to grow too fast is a path to disaster. While we are recording things so that that ministry can be use as a model for other ministries in the future, this ministry plans on staying within the God given limits. Any help to other areas, at this time, will only be through the existing ministries within the Philippines which PAME is working with. That means only through Dr. Nono, and the plan is to remain within this limit and expand only as God leads Dr. Nono.
The second word of this name is 'American'. PAME is a 'bridge' ministry designed to bridge the separation between American support ministries and Filipino national ministries in non-financial ways. Any ongoing financial support will only go through a regular mission board after the Filipino ministry meets the basic requirement of that mission board.
In addition, it needs to be acknowledged that the main support is coming from ministries in America and PAME is only trying to connect those ministries to the Filipino ministries and then step out of the relationship once it is established. While PAME will be available to help resolve problems in the future, it will not remain a permanent part of the relationship. In addition it needs to be noted that 'American' is the secondary word in this name because the primary support ministry is actually the senior Filipino ministries.
The last two words in this name are 'Ministry Enhancement' because PAME is not starting new churches nor will it ever directly start any new ministry. All new ministries will be started from existing churches, as dictated by God within the Bible, and PAME will remain only a support ministry which recognizes the God given ultimate authority in the local church. PAME will not provide support outside of God's authority structure. In addition, PAME is not aimed at the needs of starting a ministry but at the needs of a ministry which has already been started and has proven spiritual results but which can produce greater spiritual results with some non-financial help. Again, while PAME intends to help Filipino ministries meet the requirements to be accepted by a Mission Board, PAME will not do the function of a Mission Board and supply long-term financial support. That type of support comes through a Mission Board and PAME will not take on that responsibility.
In 2012 Dr. Gerard Cotter was on a mission trip with his mission pastor when the pastor told him to do two things: develop a series of lessons so that others could learn to study their Bible like he did and pray about going to the Philippines. The study lessons developed teach God's step-by-step procedure (from the Bible) that allows us to get a perfect interpretation of a perfect Bible which is a perfect picture of a perfect God. In the English this can only be done with God's Holy Spirit directing the interpretation of the KJC 1611. The result is an interpretation which is NEVER in conflict with any other part of the Bible which is interpreted using the same method. The results prove that there are no 'problem verses' in God's perfect Word but that all 'problems' are due to the person using an erroneous method of interpretation of the person not following the method exactly as required.
This method is described on the ljc1611kjv.com web site. It is also applied (at the time of the creation of the PAME web site) to over 6,000 verses in 20 books of the Bible which are supported by over 125,000 links to other places in the Bible. (Scripture interprets scripture.) Where most commentaries claim that there are 'problem verses', or just skip those verses, the Book Studies at ljc1611kjv.com, deal with every sentence, every verse, every phrase, every punctuation mark and every significant word, to varying degrees. No sentences or verses are skipped and the contextual consideration is always kept in mind. (Most doctrinal errors can be shown to be wrong simply by looking at the context of any Bible verse which is referenced.)
In addition to creating the requested lessons, Dr. Cotter obeyed his pastor and prayed. 'God I don't want to go to the Philippines! It's on the other side of the world. It's a different culture. It's a third-world country and I enjoy America.' During the next year several supported missionaries to the Philippines visited the church and presented their work. That included Dr. Edgar Nono. Early in 2013 the pastors in Rochester Hills Baptist Church talked to Dr. Nono about the work of Dr. Cotter and Dr. Nono said 'Come over here and help my people learn how to understand the Bible God's way'. In March of 2013 Dr. Cotter had sold or given away almost everything that he owned and moved to the Philippines. His Journal can be read here.).
During the next 6 months Dr. Cotter visited the works of several missionaries which are supported by his home church. He then met with Dr. Nono and discussed what he saw as the greatest need. Dr. Nono said that he had been praying about that exact need for over 10 years and knew what to do but needed help. With God's direction and blessing, PAME was created.
Philippine is the first word in the name of PAME because the Filipinos are the most important people in this ministry. In addition, Dr. Nono, a Filipino pastor, is the ultimate authority of this ministry and the plan is for a Filipino to always be in charge. One of the problems that resulted from earlier (other) American missionary efforts was due to cultural differences and the resulting culturally-based misunderstandings. There are a number of these misunderstandings which are held by some Americans and by some Filipinos. While avoiding arguments about how valid or invalid such beliefs may be, having a Filipino Senior Pastor, who has extensive experience in both cultures, run things and be in charge of the interface with American ministries should eliminate many of these problems.
A simple example is that Dr. Nono brings in senior American pastors to help teach Filipino pastors, but he remains in charge so that he has the authority to clear up any misunderstandings. In addition, any training materials which are provided through PAME go through Dr. Nono. His ministry controls the distribution and no Filipino is allowed to bypass his ministry in order to get support from PAME.
There are Filipino preachers which Dr. Nono believes should be supported through the Mission Board which he established with Dr. Daniel White. However, that decision is strictly Dr. Nono's decision. Once a pastor is selected by Dr. Nono, PAME will help him to learn how to write effective support letters and help him meet the other requirements of the Mission Board. However, after that the communication between the Filipino missionary and the supporting church pass through the Mission Board and not through PAME. Only if there is a need for an alternate path of communication, or verification of what is claimed in the mission letter, will PAME get involved and then only if requested. If requested, PAME will help the supporting church to get a separate witness of what a supported missionary is actually doing.
Starting in January, 2014 a 6-month class was started to train Filipino national pastors who had varying degrees of prior training. Dr. Cotter taught Hermeneutics and incorporated Methods of Study into the same lessons. Among other things the pastors learned how to tell who was Biblically correct when they heard disagreeing doctrines taught and both doctrines were claimed to come from the Bible. Dr. Nono taught Biblical Authority and Church Doctrine while Br. Magallanes taught Church History. What some of these national pastors learned from these men disagreed with what they had had been taught prior to these classes. When they used the methods taught by Dr. Cotter to compare what they had been taught before to what Dr. Nono and Br. Magallanes taught them, they found that they had been taught error in the past. They also found out that what Dr. Nono and Br. Magallanes taught them was Biblical truth. As a result, 6 pastors and churches converted from other denominations to being fundamental Baptists who accept the KJV1611 as the inerrant Word of God. This is seen by all as God's stamp of approval upon this new ministry. With this in mind, we plan on having further classes to reach other national pastors who can benefit from this training.
There are many Filipino pastors who are doing the work of God but struggling because they don't have all of the training that they really need. PAME is helping in this area of training existing pastors and preachers. Gene Garcia taught practical soul winning along with practice sessions to help these churches become more effective in winning the lost. One pastor was so excited by what he learned that he went home and told it all to his wife with the result of her being truly saved. While she thought that she was saved before, the Holy Spirit showed her that she was trusting in her religious works and not in the finished work of the Son of God. As the saying goes: 'It would be tragic to go to Hell from a Baptist Church!'. One of the most important things that we wish to provide is Biblically based doctrines that all Baptists should know and be able to pass onto others. Not only will PAME continue to teach basic soul-winning, but PAME will also teach more advanced doctrines which result in full-time ministry workers for home, local missions and missions abroad. Related to this goal is a web based set of lessons which teach various doctrinal subjects and are available for any preacher to access. We have legal permission to copy and distribute these lessons so that pastors can use them to teach their own church members without violating copyright. In addition, we are seeking more advanced and Biblically sound lessons which will also be made available to help preachers. Many of the preachers had nothing more than a Bible to use as they led their church. They didn't even have a concordance and were asking for books which would help them teach their people things which were beyond basic doctrines. PAME seeks to help in this area by providing the lessons on the web which allows wider distribution and lower costs.
Please note that the prior section said that we are helping existing pastors. This restriction is for two reasons. First, Paul told the Corinthian believers that he could not give them the meat of the Word
because they were spiritual babes
. We have a God given responsibility to verify people's spiritual maturity before giving them access to the meat of the Word
. In addition, the authors of some lessons specified certain restrictions upon our publishing and distributing lessons which they authored. To be right with God we must respect all copyrights and restrictions specified by authors. We are not advertising this site widely but only telling pastors of related churches about it. In addition, certain lessons require a password to access and only the allowed pastors are given that password. Thus, we are providing access to all Biblically valid lessons that will help preachers in their ministries while also restricting access as required by the authors.
In addition to providing lessons on the web, Dr. Nono brought senior pastors from America who taught advanced doctrines such as proper understanding of Bible prophecy. While things can be learned by reading a book or web page, there are many advantages to personally being taught certain things. PAME plans on continuing to provide access to these types of pastors and the lessons which they learned through years of diligent study and ministry. As they make lessons available, those will also be made available to Filipino pastors to use when training their own people. Thus, a significant part of the PAME plan is to make doctrinally sound lessons and messages available for Filipino pastors to use when training their own people.
The internet, in many ways, is like a giant city. There are a lot of good things available there but there are also many deadly things and many dangerous and tempting things which can fool people into believing they are innocent. With this in mind, PAME is collecting web addresses of churches and other ministries which provide messages and lessons which teach sound doctrine. These will also be made available to Filipino pastors as other sources of help for their people. This list of recommended web sites is not intended to restrict Filipinos but to help them avoid dangerous doctrines, such as those taught by cults, which may seem innocent or even good on the surface but which will cause God's people to lose God's blessings and which can even cause the judgment of God to come down on His people.
PAME is helping Filipino national pastors get signed up with American support ministries such as Beams-Bibles. These ministries expect to receive reports back which show spiritual results and justify the expenses involved in helping national pastors. However, many Filipino pastors have not been trained in generating such reports. Initially, the requirement to generate support letters and other reports can seem to be overwhelming. PAME intends to train Filipinos in record keeping and report generation but also plans to do the necessary follow-up until such reporting and record keeping becomes habit. While this might seem to be an American thing, one only needs to look at I-Chronicles and similar places within the Bible to see that God recorded names and numbers. Thus, PAME is really trying to help Filipino ministries to learn to act like God does in the Bible.
In addition, failure to provide such records can result in the American ministry stopping the support of the Filipino ministry. It is understood that many Filipinos feel that reporting should not be a requirement. While not going into the Biblical basis for having such a requirement, it will be noted that God gave the money to the people who have it. God also says that all people will give an answer to God for what they did with what God gave to them. The demanded reports are the basis of the accountability demanded by God from the people who have the money which Filipinos desire to have in order to support their work. Therefore, regardless of agreement with the requirement for reporting, it is the right of the people who have the money to make such a requirement in exchange for giving financial support. In addition, they sincerely believe that it is also a God given requirement for them. Anyone who disagrees is free to seek financial help elsewhere. Therefore, the requirement to provide ongoing reports of the spiritual results is only helping Filipinos to meet the basic requirements for receiving ongoing support for their ministry. In addition, it also helps to provide accountability by the Filipino, which God requires from all saved people, including pastors.
When we were young we were taught to count by memorizing numbers and their order. We were then taught to add by memorizing things like '2+2=4'. Then we were taught the general rule of addition and spent several years with teachers giving us problems to practice the general rule which works for any numbers.
Likewise, we were taught basic Bible doctrines to memorize and taught to memorize answers for known doctrinal errors. However, very few people, including preachers, know the general rules for finding the true Biblical answers to doctrinal error. That is one reason why preachers look for good doctrinally sound books. They are looking for answers found by others. While this is a good thing to do, God's preachers also need to know the general rules for finding God's answer to any problem within the Bible. It sounds good to say that the Bible has all of the answers for life, but that saying is useless to the man who does not know how to find those answers. One of the basic reasons that we have so many competing beliefs which all claim to be 'Christian' is because God's preachers don't know how to answer doctrinal error when they encounter it and they have to wait for someone else to tell them the answer because they don't know Gods general rules for finding any answer within the Bible.
PAME is enabling Filipino pastors to defend the faith by teaching them God's general rules for finding answers within the Bible. The first thing is to change the approach to doctrinal answers that is taught. We are taught to memorize the identification of specific doctrinal errors. However, banks use a better way to teach people how to identify counterfeit money. There are too many ways to counterfeit money for someone to memorize them all and people are always coming up with more. The same is true about doctrinal error. Therefore, no one can know all of the types of counterfeit money and no one can know all of the doctrinal errors that exist or that will be created. Therefore, the Banks don't try to do the impossible and neither should God's people try to do the impossible. The banks teach people to know all of the minute details of the true money and to determine that anything which is different must be a counterfeit. Likewise, PAME teaches God's preachers to identify the characteristics of God, and tells the preachers to do the same for God's people.
The Bible warns that people will come and preach another god, another lord, another Jesus and/or another Christ. It warns that if we are not careful to know what the Bible teaches about the true God, the true Lord, the true Jesus and the true Christ then we will believe doctrinal error. ljc1611kjv.com has notes on every place in the New Testament that has Lord
, Jesus
, Christ
, Son
, Saviour
, king
, lamb
, and is developing the same for God
. All of these notes show how these names have a consistent doctrinal definition across the Bible while also having many doctrinal applications. These notes also show how each usage properly fits within the context where it is found. Many people, including 'Good Godly Bible believing fundamental Baptist preachers' teach doctrinal error about these names because they were taught the doctrinal error and they believed what they were taught without verifying that teaching against what the Bible actually says. ljc1611kjv.com not only teaches what the Bible actually says but provides all of the cross-references required to verify that is said on that web site.
The only way that God's people are going to avoid doctrinal error about God is to truly know all of the details which the Bible teaches about God and know that anything which goes against what the Bible actually says is doctrinal error. Instead of teaching all of the known doctrinal errors and how to answer them, PAME teaches the character of God and teaches God's people to reject anything which goes against the Biblically defined character of God.
In addition to providing lessons on the character of God, the general rules for proper interpretation of the Word of God are taught and written up on ljc1611kjv.com. Most of the rest of ljc1611kjv.com is an application of these rules so that people can look up the true interpretation of many places within the New Testament (and come of the Old Testament). The notes there can also be used as an example of using the general rules of interpretation by those people who wish to be able to do this thing for themselves and to help God's people.
In addition to the interpretation, PAME provides many lessons on the application of the Bible within our life. This is the main ministry of preachers and these lessons come from several senior American pastors. These lessons are accessed by clicking on the Lessons link found at the top of each page on this site.
The 'Great Commission' requires us to take the gospel to all of the world. It is obvious that we can not personally do that as individuals, nor even as single churches. Therefore, we support missionaries who can go where we can not go. That said, Filipinos can go places and give the gospel where Americans can not go or where they can not effectively give the gospel. One of the simplest reasons is that white or black Americans stick out everywhere in Asia and always have people watching them. Therefore, where it is illegal to preach the gospel, it is easier for Filipinos to do so, without government interference, than it is for Americans. The Americans are watched and quickly stopped and thrown out of the country while the Filipinos appear to be poor locals and are ignored by the government.
Another factor is that most Filipinos grow up in third-world conditions while Americans grow up in first-world conditions. There are environments that require always cooking over a fire on the ground, living in grass huts where the floors turn to mud in rainy season, where there is no refrigeration nor power and many other similar conditions. These pose hardships to Americans which can interfere with their ministry if not drive them from the field. However, the same conditions pose no hardship to Filipinos who grew up in those conditions.
Another consideration is the fact that most Filipinos grow up speaking at least three languages while most Americans grow up speaking only one. This is a major advantage that is illustrated by the fact that an America missionary team has been in Thailand for at least two years but, reportedly, each of them still need to use an interpreter. However, a Filipino missionary who has been there for three months is speaking Thai well enough to win souls. While people might claim that this is an exceptional set of circumstances, I submit that if these things were scientifically researched that people would find that these are the normal results of the differences due to being raised speaking one language as opposed to being raised speaking multiple languages.
Further, the evidence shows that a Filipino can go the same field as an American and the cost of the Filipino is typically 10% of the cost for the American. In addition, the Filipino often will have better results for the kingdom of God because of the typical difference in zeal.
All of this is not to indicate that Americans should stop being missionaries. Nor is it to indicate that Americans should do less and rely upon Filipinos more. However, we will each personally answer to God for what we do with the things which He gives to us, including our money. Therefore, when we must select which ministries and which missionaries we support, especially when we can reliably verify what each is doing for the kingdom of God, we should prayerfully consider the work done as a function of the support given.
This has already been covered to some extent. The fact is that several pastors who are responsible for selecting which missionaries to support reject Filipinos, and even drop support for missionaries who are in the Philippines, due to lack of reporting at the level that is required by the supporting churches. Part of this is because many Filipinos have not been taught to report, nor have they been taught how to report, and many have not been taught the Biblical basis for requiring reporting. In addition, some people are teaching that supporting churches that require reports should not be making those demands. Finally, there are other reasons, but these are some of the main sources of problems.
The majority of these problems can be dealt with by providing education, which PAME is trying to provide. While there can be many arguments from the Bible used to support the requirement for reports, the simplest is the fact that each of use are accountable to God and each will personally have to give an answer to God for what he did with what God gave to him. The people that God gave the money to must personally answer to God for what that money was used to support. Because of this personally accountability, they have a God given responsibility to verify that their mission support money is going to people who are actually taking the gospel to the world. Proper reporting provides must of that required accountability. Therefore the people who are responsible for selecting missionaries to support pretty much all agree that the people receiving support can meet their reporting requirements or go find their support elsewhere. Further, they don't want to hear arguments to the contrary and any supported person who insists upon arguing usually finds themselves dropped because of an 'ungodly wrong attitude'.
As mentioned at the top of this web page, there have been requests to expand this ministry. Just as the 'one-world church' is rejected, so also is the similar concept rejected when applied to a ministry. Also, just as Godly churches are similar in doctrine, structure and general things while allowing for differences in details, any church ministry should have the same structure. It is hoped that, in the future, other ministries can use this one as a model while being independent and while allowing for required differences.