May 15, 2006, Orlando, Florida USA 

The Timothy Pent household

A LITTLE ABOUT OURSELVES

            My parents were pioneers in their own way. I am the 7th of 8 children and was home educated from kindergarten through college, thirty years before the home schooling movement began. My father was an evangelist, and we traveled as a family all over the United States for the first 15 years of my life.  Our purpose was to demonstrate the power of the Gospel in the life of a family and promote a more serious use of the Scripture by reading it together daily. (The story is told in the book, Ten P’s in a Pod.)
My wife, Boni, and I have nine children, six daughters and three sons ranging in age from 24 down to 6. We have home educated them all from kindergarten (and for those old enough) through high school. Our oldest two have graduated from college, our third is majoring in Mechanical Engineering at the University of Central Florida, and our fourth was a dual enrollment student at the University of Central Florida for the 2005-2006 school year. The rest are still home schooled. (To meet each member of our family, visit our website at www.PentFamily.com)

WHERE ARE YOU NOW?           

Our family currently lives in Central Florida (near Disney World) on an acre of land that was part of a parcel my family had owned since 1942. This was long before this area was such a popular international tourist and trade center.  We have resided here since Boni and I were married almost 26 years ago. The area was quite rural in the beginning with orange groves surrounding us and the ability to have milk goats and other “earthy” projects.  Over the years our closest neighbors were aunts and uncles, brothers and sisters, and their children.

OUR CHALLENGE

Twenty years ago I served in helping to establish a new local Presbyterian church in our area as an elder and worship leader, and our family works and worships there currently. In serving there, along with working hard in my own business to earn a living, we have been challenged out of necessity to choose between the best and the endless good.  So we have asked, “When all else fails, what is the minimum a family should accomplish in fulfilling God’s command to “teach these things diligently to your children,” and how can the local church come alongside them?

WORK THE WORD

My trade has been landscape contracting as my father’s was before me. Our goal even in our work is to “seek first the kingdom of God.” While working a trade instead of being in full-time ministry seems inefficient at times, we have noticed an unusual effect on our children. As with the apostles, what appeared as the inefficiencies of working trades or even being in prison became the means of building God’s Kingdom by God’s providence. Through even simple toil for the Lord’s sake, mixed with daily doses of the Scripture, we have seen spiritual fruit in our children, which is the goal of any ministry. An affection for the Lord, an independent faith, and a diligent work ethic stand out in a materialistic and spiritually lethargic culture. Perhaps limitations are as crucial a part of what God is doing as what we are immediately able to accomplish - as long as Christ’s simple maxim is lived: “He that hears the Word and does it…his house will stand.”    

A NEW OPPORTUNITY

We have wondered increasingly over the last few years if the next reformation might be discipling the nations by families. We have witnessed the rise of the home school movement worldwide on the one hand and the pitiful similarity between marriage solidarity in the church and in the world on the other. Isn’t the current need to demonstrate the difference between Christ’s ways and the world’s ways at the household level?  The front line of Kingdom growth in the early church were “elders, men…who have faithful children” and men who “lead quiet and peaceful lives in godliness and honesty. For…God our Savior…will have all men to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth.”

HOW ABOUT SOUTH KOREA

When we heard last November that there was a possible new movement beginning in South Korea, we were very interested. Pastors in South Korea were asking families from the United States to mentor them as families in father-led discipleship and home schooling for a year or two.  Family Mission International (familymission.org) was formed for that specific purpose under the leadership of Brad Voeller, known in the States for his pioneering work in distance learning. We interviewed with the board of directors in Texas and are now in the process of completing our existing contracts here, selling our home, learning a new language with the help of Yae Jin Joo (a young woman from South Korea who is living with our family for a few months), and seeing if friends would like to help support such a wild idea.  (We need to raise close to half of our support, and the churches we work with in South Korea will provide the other half.)  The time frame could be as early as September this year.
 

TILL NEXT TIME

We hope to post monthly updates here, and will see from month to month if there might be a reformation - at least in the souls of our family…and yours.

Family Missions International along with 12,000 member Global Mission Church in Seoul are hosting a conference July 1-4. Timothy and Boni will fly to Korea for a week to speak to parents at several churches. They will also tour Seoul, attempting to gather information on housing and daily living in the big city. Their trip will also include an outing with Seoul homeschoolers and a time of meeting and prayer with the FMI missions team. Please pray for safe travels and that they would be an encouragement to those they speak to. It is also important to find a place for us to stay when the family arrives in September and learn a little bit about how life will run in a brand new place.

“God be merciful unto us, and bless us; and cause His face to shine upon us; that Thy way may be known upon earth, Thy saving health among all nations.”                                                                                        

 Psalm 67:1-2

June 26, 2006

Dear Family, Friends, and Church Family,

Our family has accepted a call to serve in South Korea, and in the Biblical model of missions, we invite our comrades in arms to join your hearts with us for the Gospel’s sake.  We all have been asked repeatedly to join forces with friends and Christian ministries in various short and long-term mission projects.  In order to be worthy of your interest in this particular one of ours, the appeal comes out of (1) its origin, (2) the current setting, (3) the future potential, and (4) the nature of our work there.

ORIGIN

For twenty-six years, we have labored side by side with many of you both in ministry and in our work, raising our families in the name of and for the sake of Christ. Throughout these years, my aim has been to encourage other fathers in leading their families in family worship and discipleship. Our expectation has been that through “quiet and peaceable lives in godliness and honesty” men would be “saved and come to the knowledge of the truth.” As we have discipled our family, imperfectly as it has been, a similar vision of Kingdom growth has been coming together around the world. Who would have thought that such a humble idea as household ministry might be the means of global reformation? While it is not the only means of Kingdom growth, it should certainly be the underpinnings of it. “Elders…the husbands of one wife…children in subjection with all gravity. For if a man knows not how to rule his own house, how shall he take care of the church of God?” We believe that the integrity of the Gospel message to the world is inseparably connected to the solidarity of the family testimony. What was preached by the early church had to be lived by its leaders and their families! (One-tenth of the entire Roman empire being converted by the end of the first century speaks to the effectiveness of what Jesus called “a city on a hill” made up of “men in a house who light a candle…so that all who enter in may see the light. In this way let your light shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father.”) In contrast today, Christian families in general, and ministry leaders’ families in particular, are struggling for survival as much as the secular world. A most important focus of the Great Commission must include training households in “all I have commanded you” if Kingdom growth is to be sustained and protected. The household churches in China remind us today that healthy growth flourishes even when normal external help, supply, and organization are not available. The household is the lowest common denominator of Christ’s Church, and His promise of protection is at that level, “He that hears these sayings of Mine and does them…his house will stand.” This vision in our souls crossed paths with Family Mission International (FMI) last November (www.familymission.org). FMI posted an invitation to families to serve by households to South Korean households in mentoring father-led family discipleship and family worship using a home education model.

CURRENT SETTING

       In the Church

It appears the Lord is stirring again in South Korea. We remember hearing of their fervency in prayer, gathering by the thousands twenty years ago or so. It was just over 100 years ago that missionaries were first allowed into this primarily Buddhist nation.  The last of the developed nations to open to the Gospel has challenged all of us with her fervency.  However, though the South Korean church is second only to the U.S. in the number of missionaries sent out, there is trouble.  Intense competition in South Korea’s educational system has resulted in extreme pressure and long hours of study for South Korean children and young people. The influence of the West, along with materialism, has also greatly affected their youth. South Korean Christians are saying they have never been trained in discipling their families. The next generation is at risk as they fear losing their children to the culture, and they are determined to remedy the situation. These pioneers are willing to sacrifice anything to see their children wholly devoted to the Lord.
Three years ago, three pastors began home educating their children and sought help in home education and family discipleship. Brad Voeller, founder of FMI, was contacted and answered the call to help these South Korean Christians build strong families through training in family discipleship and home education. There are now over 300 home schooling families in South Korea, and the interest in home education is exploding. The concern now is that the movement is growing too fast.

       In the Nation

The historic pressures of survival South Korea has faced, being surrounded by the competing national interests of China, Japan, Russia, and currently North Korea, has perhaps accentuated the national interest of South Korea in statistics released recently that the birth rate there is at an all time low. In fact, South Korea’s birth rate is currently the lowest in the world.  Over the next ten years, at current rates, the population of South Korea will be reduced to half the size it is now.  Couple this with growing suicide rates for their youth, due to the extreme pressure of competition to succeed in educational and employment arenas, and the nation is faced with a serious problem indeed.  As the western idea of women in the workplace grows and families are kept small due to current socio-economic pressures, government leaders are seeing the need for a cultural shift.  So while pastors there have begun to see the great need for their people to have a more eternal perspective about building God’s kingdom through their families, public interest  is open to new ideas as well.
 

FUTURE POTENTIAL

Over the last few years, we have wondered increasingly if the next reformation might be discipling the nations by families. Our hope is that God is moving in the East. The persecuted church in China is now the fastest growing church in the world. (If current growth rates continue, China will become the global center of evangelical Christianity.  [WORLD magazine June 17, 2006, p.11] ) Even in Japan, where less than 1% of the people profess to be Christians, Christianity is starting to grow. North Korea (according to a representative from Voice of the Martyrs who recently spoke to our church) is the most hostile and oppressive nation to Christianity in the world. It seems that God is raising up this mission in South Korea for building His kingdom through godly households at a strategic time and in a strategic place. Brad Voeller, founder of FMI, hopes South Korea will just be the beginning.  The entire Pacific Rim is prime for family discipleship, and his vision is to establish this family ministry in South Korea and then move on to the next country in Asia and then the next and so on throughout the world.

OUR WORK THERE           

Home education is the means for our family to be able to encourage South Korean families in family discipleship and family worship. Our work will include leading three home school co-ops at three different churches each week. Koreans enjoy learning by example, and our family will mentor 8-10 families at each co-op, teaching unit studies, English, and family discipleship. Timothy will be teaching and working with the fathers, encouraging them in leading, nurturing, and discipling their families. Boni will be encouraging the mothers in their roles as godly wives and mothers. Our older children will be able to encourage and work with families with middle school and high school students. Even our youngest children (who have been picking up the Korean language faster than I am) will help by teaching English. There is next to no material translated, and each co-op will need a translator present, yet this fledgling movement has begun to swell by a very determined and disciplined people who see a desperate need for a cultural shift for the survival of their homes and of Christianity in their country. We will also have the opportunity to carry the vision of family discipleship, family worship, and home education to a growing number of churches across South Korea.

We are privileged to have this opportunity to be part of this new work God is doing in South Korea. We appreciate your prayers as we seek to fulfill God’s purposes for us.

Thank you for “your fellowship in the gospel from the first day until now, being confident of this very thing, that He which has begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ.”
      

The Timothy Pent Family (www.PentFamily.com)

Prayer Requests:

• Timothy and Boni traveling to South Korea for a conference

      (June 29 – July 8)

• Courage and protection for the South Korean Christian families who have a vision for building God’s Kingdom through godly households

• Success in learning the Korean language

• Progress and completion of remaining contracts in Florida

• Raising of support

    ($3000 per month for living expenses and $15,000 for moving and travel expenses)

• Jared staying in Florida for the fall semester at UCF and continuing to run the business

• A smooth transition to South Korea in September

• Temporary housing in South Korea since we will have to return in the spring to complete the contract for Apopka High School

 The possibilty of this mission is only through your generous donations. Please prayerfully consider donating to this mission. To make a donation visit the contact us page for the Family Mission International address. Please make checks payable to Family Mission International specifying Pent family on the memo line.