Leader
of Leaders
With a
Servant’s
Heart
By Rich Yoder,
Caribbean Field Leader,
One Mission Society
In 1992, a young pastor from the Caribbean arrived at the One
Mission Society seminary in Medellín, Colombia, with his wife
and two young sons. Pachy excelled in his studies and returned
to his country in 1996, turning down a generous offer to pastor
a growing church in Colombia. It would have been easy to stay
in Colombia, but his call was, and still is, to the people of the
Caribbean.
Soon after his return home, he became the rector of his denomination’s seminary. He then began to implement courses in
evangelism and church planting at the seminary so that pastors
would not just fill the pulpits but multiply themselves and the
people in their churches.
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In 1999, the OMS ministry of Every Community for Christ began to partner with his denomination with a goal of training and
providing training materials for evangelism and church planting. Pachy was named the ECC coordinator for the initiative
because of his heart and passion for reaching his people. Initial
church multiplication training was held in 2006 at the seminary.
While not all the pastors in attendance immediately “bought
into” the principles, some did, and the church began to grow.
One older pastor of a traditional church especially did not
like the principle of multiplying small churches, so he left the
training event. Today, this same pastor is one of the strongest
proponents of church multiplication.
In 2010, the Lord placed a strategy in the heart of a young
pastor while he attended an ECC training event. When the young
pastor returned and shared the strategies with Pachy, Pachy received it as a word from the Lord. Just one year after becoming
the president of his denomination, Pachy led the initiative, with
the goal of reaching every person in his country with the Gospel.
A key part of the plan was to mobilize and train more than
18,000 lay leaders, giving them about 140 hours of training in
evangelism, church planting, and leadership. This was to be accomplished through 26 local training centers over a three-year
period and would involve two to four denominations.
After a little more than two years into the initiative, more than
450 local training centers have trained over 51,000 lay leaders
from 16 denominations!
With this growth has come the challenge of training people
at the various levels and attracting new leaders to give leadership at local, regional, and national levels. Pachy and his team
created two additional higher levels of training, regional and
national, to provide stronger practical leadership skill development. This was an important decision since there has not been
practical leadership training available to the population.
Pachy gives all the honor and glory to the Lord for sending
the Holy Spirit over believers and pre-believers alike. The Lord
has worked out many details that only he could do.
At a recent missions conference, Pachy listened and took
notes as young pastors preached, cast vision, and called people to missionary service. He has a true servant’s heart and
models this to others. Leaders are drawn to him as a leader.
Pachy is also grateful for all the ways in which OMS has supported and encouraged him and the denominational ministries.
He specifically thanks the Theological Education team, ECC,
MFM, and the OMS prayer team, all of whom have provided
direct and indirect support. OMS USA and MFM Canada have
also played a strong role in supporting the ministries during
critical times of need.
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