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“Proclamation and demonstration”: OM Ships marks 50 years with a renewed vision for sharing the Gospel

OM Ships Logos Hope

As OM Ships International marks 50 years of ministry, DAVID ADAMS speaks with CEO Seelan Govender about the organisation’s impact, how it’s fared during the COVID-19 pandemic and a vision for the future…

For half a century, OM’s ship ministry has been reaching out to people across the world to share the love of Christ with those who don’t yet know Him.

Yet those working at the heart of the non-denominational Christian ministry organisation – which last month celebrated its 50th anniversary – say the call of its mission to share the “good news” with the unreached remains as strong as ever.

Seelan Govender, CEO of OM Ships International, says it’s estimated that three billion people around the world remain unreached by the Gospel – a number, he adds, which is growing by 60,000 people every day. It’s those stark facts, he says, which fuel the ministry of OM Ships.

“Really we’re about sharing knowledge, help and hope within the context of OM – which is [the] organisation we serve with, in the mission to see vibrant communities of Jesus followers among least reached communities,” says Govender.

“So everything we do is pivoting towards how do we create forward momentum towards seeing these communities have the opportunity to experience the love of Jesus? The ship ministry primarily functions as a catalyst…to change the trajectory of three billion people in the world today that, if the church does not respond, would live and die without ever knowing this love of Jesus and having that demonstrated to them in the life of one of His followers…We want to do everything we can through the ship ministry playing its role as a catalyst to see that the trajectory change…”

OM Ships Logos Hope

OM Ships ship, the Logos Hope. PICTURE: OM Ships. 

Founded in 1970 after OM (Operation Mobilisation) founder George Verwer shared a vision for a ships ministry in a prayer meeting in Bolton, England, several years earlier, its maiden voyage from London to Colombia took place the following year. Since then, the OM Ships ministry has seen its ships visit hundreds of ports around the world where, over what’s typically been a two or three week stint, crew members, all of whom are volunteers, are involved with outreach and community care activities in conjunction with local churches. That includes inviting people aboard the ship, which, as well as being home to the crew, is home to a “floating bookfair” of more than 5,000 titles.

The ministry has operated four different vessels over its 50 years including the first ship, the Logos, which was purchased in 1970 and sailed for 17 years, as well as the long-serving Doulos, the smaller Logos II and the current vessel, the Logos Hope, a former car ferry which was purchased in 2004 and launched into service in early 2009. It also has shore-based technical and literature operations in Germany, the UK and US.

OM Ships Seelan Govender aboard Logos Hope

Seelan Govinder, CEO of OM Ships International. PICTURE: OM Ships.

 

“What we can count is 49 million people visited the ship in terms of the ports. But when we ask the true impact of the ship’s history, I think that would be a rather difficult question to respond to because so many of these because so many of these people have gone on to start ministries, be in the marketplace, [and] that’s really effected significant change for the Kingdom as a result of their time and what they learned on board the ship.”

– Seelan Govender, CEO of OM Ships International.

It’s estimated that some 100,000 volunteers have served as crew on board the ships over the ministry’s existence. It’s impact involves much bigger numbers.

“What we can count is 49 million people visited the ship in terms of the ports,” says Govender, speaking from Germany where he is based with his wife Caroline and two children.

“But when we ask the true impact of the ship’s history, I think that would be a rather difficult question to respond to because so many of these people have gone on to start ministries [that have] really effected significant change for the Kingdom as a result of their time and what they learned on board the ship.”

The ship typically has about 400 crew aboard at any one time (although this was reduced to about 300 as a result of the coronavirus pandemic). The volunteers, who hail from about 60 to 65 different countries, spend periods of three months, six months, a year or two years on board fulfilling a variety of roles, both for those with professional qualifications and those without  – everything from helping out in the galley and working as a medical officer, school teacher or electrician through to manning the bookstore and being involved in discipleship and outreach activities.

Govender, who comes from Durban, South Africa, and first became involved with OM after encountering the crew of Doulos during a visit to Mozambique in 1995, says OM aims to use the ship’s port visits to “galvanise and use that to inspire and awaken in the church this understanding that the whole communities of people that have not experienced the love of Jesus because nobody’s lived among them that express that love to them”.

Outling the organisation’s vision for the future, he says that over the next decade, the ship’s ministry is aiming to see a million churches mobilised to share the Gospel of Christ.

“By that we simply mean, how do we point people who know and love Jesus – which is the church – towards whole communities that today…still do not love Jesus?” he says.

OM Ships are also aiming to inspire a “movement” of a million people praying persistently over the next decade for these unreached communities.

“Scripture and history have shown us every great move of God has been preceded a significant time of prayer and that’s what we are about as well.”

Govender says the organisation is also looking to work in collaboration and partnership with other organisations in order to see a million people “be the hands and feet of Jesus” in these communities.

“There are young people and our desire is when they come and live on board and experience everything that they get to experience and exposed to and trained in, they will leave as a disciple-maker,” he says. “And by that we simply mean, how can they be present – that is to love God and love they neighbour, how can they do the good work that God has created for them to do, because when we do that, we will become visible expression of the Kingdom of God on Earth and, thirdly, how can they teach others to do likewise?”

OM Ships Logos Hope crew

 Crew members aboard the Logos Hope typically come from around 60 different nations. PICTURE: OM Ships

Govender says that one of the key challenges for OM Ships in mobilising churches is to encourage conversations around “deconstruction” of the idea of a separation between the secular and the sacred.

“Spiritual stuff is not only done within the context of the four walls in the church but is actually the evidence of the church in society,” he says. “So, for us, the desire of mobilising the church is that the church understand its role as a lifeblood in the community beyond a place of meeting one hour a week…”

That means Christians understanding their identity – “that we are God’s representatives in His Kingdom” – and looking at what role the local church plays as “as a visible expression of the Kingdom of God” as well as how society is being changed or transformed “through the fact that we follow Jesus”.

“I think part of our challenge is that we only – and I’ve been at times guilty of this – is that we only talk so much about the eternal reality but not the current reality,” says Govender. “I’m a firm believer that the Gospel impacts both the eternal reality but the current reality as well. And the church is part of that.”

That involves wrestling with the concept that the idea of mission is not for a “select few”.

“Through the experience of people coming to the ship we want them to intimately understand that we are followers of Jesus who happen to be teachers, we are followers of Jesus who happen to be engineers, we have followers of Jesus who happen to be housewives. And we work in those spaces as follows of Jesus and live in the spaces as followers of Jesus.”

– Seelan Govender

“It’s not a special calling, it’s for the church of God who’s reflecting the glory of their King in society – everyone,” says Govender. “So I think, for us, we are not first and foremost engineers who happen to be followers of Jesus or teachers who happen to be followers of Jesus. Through the experience of people coming to the ship we want them to intimately understand that we are followers of Jesus who happen to be teachers, we are followers of Jesus who happen to be engineers, we have followers of Jesus who happen to be housewives. Aand we work in those spaces as follows of Jesus and live in the spaces as followers of Jesus.”

The coronavirus pandemic did significantly impact the work of the OM Ships ministry – as well as reducing crew numbers, it has meant port visits were cancelled for several months last year. The Logos Hope went to the port of Curacao in the Caribbean for maintenance while the crew had to adjust the way they work and engage virtually with churches around the world instead of in person.

“[I]t’s given us the opportunity to reflect,” says Govender. “We are quite clear that the mission continues to be the mission – the mission has not changed. But what has changed is the models that we are employing to affect the mission and I think the pandemic has given us a challenging but unique opportunity to evaluate ‘Are we truly doing all we can?’ and ‘Is there an opportunity to innovate and pivot?’”

This could see the ship staying longer in ports and spending longer building relationships with people there – in Govender’s words, “really trying to focus on mobilising the church within the context of where they’re at in vulnerable marginalised communities and what does the Kingdom of God mean to people like that and what is the good news in that?”

He cites the recent visit of the ship to Bahamas in the aftermath of Hurricane Dorian, which caused massive destruction when it struck the island nation in September, 2019, as an example of what that can look like. Invited by another Christian organisation – YWAM, the ship’s crew spent months involved in sharing the Gospel through both “proclamation” and “demonstration”.

“They simply asked us to come and help be the hands and feet of Jesus – [in] reconstruction, prayer, Bible study – and, for us, it gave us much more a sense of the pivot as to the holistic understanding of the Kingdom, that it’s not proclamation only but we have to demonstrate,” says Govender.

“It’s one thing to say Jesus loves you, it’s another thing to demonstrate it in my life that Jesus loves you and we need both to go hand-in-hand for the Kingdom to advance.”

OM Ships Bahamas outreach

OM Ships crew at work in the Bahamas being the “hands and feet” of Jesus. PICTURE: OM Ships. 

For Govender, the mission of OM to share the Gospel with unreached people is personal. Coming from a Hindu background (he came to Christ as a teenager after his sister, who married a Christian, invited him to church, and eventually his entire immediate family have also come to know Christ), he says he knows from first hand experience just how important it is.

“So when I talk about doing everything possible through the ship ministry to see people and help people to have the opportunity to know and love Jesus, it’s because I intimately know the power of the Gospel’s transformation in my own life and the life of our family,” he says. “It has transformed as completely and I do not want to live my life not giving that opportunity to people that do not know that today. Because their lives, their societies, will be transformed when they come into contact with Jesus.”

To find out how you can be involved in the OM Ships ministry, head to www.om.org/ships/

 

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