For instance, one group of Brazilian Christians uses the app as they fellowship with Afghan refugees. Tippit says, “The Afghan refugees have been sent all over the world [since the Taliban seized control of the country]. And they’re receiving in Brazil thousands of Afghan refugees. The group that we’re working with has taken in a number of them. They use the Portuguese app and the Dari app because the materials are exactly the same. They can disciple Brazilians and Afghans using both apps.”

Tippit says that’s the ultimate vision for this app: discipleship across languages. “Because you find in the book of Acts when people heard the Gospel in their own language, everyone was in amazement.”

Get involved

You can join this same work by downloading the app for free. It’s available in the Apple Store and Google Play. Tippit says, “There are people from all over the world right here in the US. Do you know someone who speaks another language like Russian, Romanian, Dari, Arabic, Spanish, or Portuguese? We have all this material in those languages.”

Just search for “Sammy Tippit” to download the English app. To download the app in another language, Tippit says, “Just type in ‘Sammy Tippet’ and put the language: ‘Sammy Tippit Punjabi’ or ‘Sammy Tippet Hindi’ or ‘Sammy Tippet Spanish.’ That discipleship app will come up and you’ll be able to download it.”

The header photo shows Afghans evacuated from Kabul, Afghanistan shortly after the Taliban takeover. (Photo courtesy of Staff Sgt. Trevor Rhynes, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons) 

It has shown signs of being more contagious than previous variants. However, the symptoms may be milder than were initially feared. Scientists will need weeks to understand Omicron’s effects, and how well current COVID-19 vaccines work against it.

Starting December 1, India instated mandatory testing for travelers into the country, regardless of vaccinations status. The vigilance comes after a horrific year for COVID-19 in India. A case spike in April and May saw hundreds of thousands test positive every day.

Evangelistic event

On November 29, Sammy Tippit Ministries held an evangelistic event in the Punjab State of India. Tippit says, “The only reason we were able to get permissions to have this meeting was things were getting better. Just now, this new variant has come out. But it’s not really infiltrated everywhere yet. Maybe in a week from now, we wouldn’t have been able to have this meeting.”

Over 20,000 people gathered for the event, but another 100,000 others watched over the internet. Tippit says, “We had a number of people come to Christ. We had thousands respond. Now though, we’re more equipped for doing this. Because now we have an app that they can download and start the discipleship process. We have the leadership training for small groups as well.”

Pray these new believers in Punjab will connect with other Christians in the area.

And praise God this event was able to happen before Omicron makes gatherings in India more difficult. Tippit says, “I just see the hand of God. We had one particular week in which we could do such a large evangelistic outreach without jeopardizing the health of people and putting them in a bad position.”

(Photo courtesy of Prashant Kharote, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons)

That’s one reason why Sammy Tippit Ministries will launch the Digital Bible Institute in 2022. Sammy Tippit says, “The problem is, you often lose some ability to reach out and minister to [non-Christian friends]. And then the further along you get in the Christian life, the further away you get from them. And then if you go into the ministry, you maybe go to a Bible college or Christian College. And before you know it, you’ve lost how they think, how they feel, who they are. You’ve lost contact with them.”

Training

Tippit sees a gap between the training available for church leaders and the training available for laypeople. “There need to be some people who are trained. Not formally to be pastors, not formally to be missionaries or anything like that. But basically, to take these new believers and help them to grow.”

Tippit says the courses will last one year, divided into four phases: prayer, evangelism, discipleship, and revival. Online classes will last 50 minutes once a week.

Pray the institute will help grow and strengthen the Church. Tippit says, “That’s the purpose of the institute: training Christians to lead small groups in churches. Whereby they can help these new believers to grow to where they can share Christ and multiply.”

Interested in joining the institute when it launches next year? Keep an eye on our website for more updates. Tippit says, “We’d love people to pray. We’re at the very beginning of this. The technology company we have partnered with is beginning to work. I’m beginning to contact and put together the curriculum and contact people who will be the teachers.”

Header photo courtesy of HaticeEROL on Pixabay. 

Tippit has been meeting with the pastors since March, and in that time all of them have stayed involved in the program.

Using the app

Most of the small group work will be done through the Sammy Tippit Discipleship App, which has been translated into Hindi. Tippit wants to use the app for discipleship instead of using social media. That way, it will be more difficult for an outside influence to shut it down.

All this training is leading to a big evangelistic event in November. Tippit says, “When people come to Christ, [our people] are ready to go with the discipleship, bring them into small groups. They’ve got resources to use to immediately start helping them to grow in Christ.”

Tippit says this is the kind of work he has been hoping to do with the app. “If we can do this in multiple languages, I’m just so excited about the potential of what would happen. What we’re looking at is something much more than providing an app. It’s providing a ministry. And it’s been a real struggle getting to this place with the app. But we’re finally here.”

Get involved

You can help Sammy Tippit Ministries keep doing this translation work, which is one of the biggest expenses of the project. Donate here.

And pray many will discover Jesus’ love through this discipleship work.

Header photo courtesy of Harish Sharma from Pixabay.

The government denies any COVID-19 outbreaks, but independent doctors see countless people sick and thousands of deaths. The Catholic Church has also reported the deaths of several priests from COVID-19. Most people in Nicaragua know someone who has been sick. The vaccinations process has only recently picked up, as the government hopes to vaccinate 32% of the population by October.

Discipleship conference

Sammy Tippit recently held an online conference to encourage Nicaraguan Christians. “It was just a tremendous blessing. The pastors were really excited. In fact, what they want to do is start discipleship and leadership training, online through Zoom with the pastors in the country.”

But not everyone in Nicaragua has good internet access. That’s where Sammy Tippit Ministries’ new app comes into play. Tippit says, “What we’re doing is we’re going to be putting the whole conference on the app, so that they can take those videos and show to their whole churches for the ones who were not able to access it online. We’re trying to build something that would help them during this time of the pandemic.”

Tippit says he wants to expand this work in Nicaragua. “After the end of the year, we’re hoping to open it up to the rest of Latin America and train Spanish-speaking pastors and leaders in this whole area of discipleship and evangelism.”

The app is now available in Spanish. Search for the Sammy Tippit Discipleship App at Google Play or the Apple App Store.

Ask God to strengthen the Nicaraguan Church.

Header photo courtesy of Kaufdex from Pixabay.

Sammy Tippit says, “When we first started going over into Eastern Europe, into the communist countries, we would be totally out of contact with anyone in America, anyone in the West. We would have to send a letter. It would take a couple of weeks to get there, and then to get back.”

Today, Tippit can engage with Christians all over the world with the click of a button. One friend in India hasn’t seen him in person for years. But they talk to each other nearly every day.

That’s one reason the Sammy Tippit Discipleship App is launching in so many different languages. Tippit says, “If you know someone that you would like to disciple, or help them to make disciples, you can get the English app and they can get the app in their language. And you can go through the same materials together.”

Fearful of new technology

Sometimes, Christians can be wary of new technology or ideas. But Tippit says the pandemic shows churches and ministries don’t have that option.

Plus, technology can bring unprecedented new opportunities for ministry. Tippit says, “We don’t need to be afraid of it. Yes, I know there are dangers. And I know there’s a lot of darkness in the technology arena. However, that’s where Jesus would go.”

Tippit certainly has had negative experiences with large technology companies. Last year, one site began blocking his content. Read more here.

But Tippit hasn’t let this experience hinder the ministry. “A lot of people get angry, saying, ‘These big giants are going to take over. Hey, I had three or four years of getting the Gospel out before they blocked me. I’m excited about what I was able to do.”

Header photo courtesy of Michael Schwarzenberger from Pixabay.

Translation work

Now, Tippit says the app is being translated into 12 more languages. “Someone can go through it here in the United States, in English. And then in another country, they can [work with] someone going through the discipleship portion in that language in that country. Whether it’s Spanish, Portuguese, Hindi, Farsi, Arabic, Russian, Chinese, we’ll have that. All those will be out by the end of August.”

Tippit hopes the app could be useful for students, especially as more people come to live in the U.S. from other countries. “There’s a Christian school that I spoke at recently, and they have 1000 international students on their campus. Well, if these students would go through the app in English they could, in their home country, bring people through it. And if they want to share Christ with them, they’ll learn how to do that.”

Download the app for free by searching “Sammy Tippit Discipleship” in the Apple app store or Google Play. Ask God to provide for this translation work.

(Header photo courtesy of Gerd Altmann from Pixabay)

Tippit says, “We have two more platforms that will help churches or groups that want to form discipleship groups using these daily devotions. It teaches people how to form and lead a small group. Then there’s another platform that’s 28 days of training people how to share their faith in Christ.”

The app also includes a huge library of many different Christian writers and thinkers, such as R.A Tory, Paul Bunyan, and Charles Spurgeon. Tippit says, “Some of the great classical Christian authors have written on the subjects of prayer, renewal, evangelism, discipleship, all of these things that we’re emphasizing in the app.”

How to get it

You can download the app for free in the Apple Store or through Google Play. Just search “Sammy Tippit Discipleship”.

Sammy Tippit Ministries will release the app in 12 more languages this year including Spanish, Hindi, and Farsi. Tippit says, “We have had a migration of people from all over the world to the United States. All of those people have friends and family back home that they would love to be able to minister to.”

Header photo courtesy of Sammy Tippit Ministries. 

“I think our hearts ought to be broken because we see that God’s heart is broken over this. Jesus said that the thief comes to steal, kill and destroy, but He came that we might have life and have it abundantly. We know there’s a thief stealing, killing, and destroying people right now at this very moment. We ought to be grieved over that because we know that God has grieved over it. Christ came just for the opposite purpose.”

A solution?

As the shootings continue, many people have ideas about how to stop them. Tippit says the debate about solutions may not be what people need the most. “People who are hurting, sometimes they need someone not to say anything to them, but just to be there for them. I think we need to just step back and let the Lord give us that love that compassion, that spirit of peace and comfort, and then reach out with that kind of spirit. I think it will make a difference.”

Grieve for families shattered by gun violence in the U.S. Pray the Holy Spirit will work in the country, crushing dark powers of oppression and anger. And pray many would see the love of Christians and be drawn to Jesus.

The header image shows flowers placed to commemorate the victims of a 2017 Las Vegas shooting. (Photo courtesy of Rmvisuals, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons)

Rampant gun violence isn’t a new problem for the U.S. Each shooting has unique circumstances and causes. But Sammy Tippit of Sammy Tippit Ministries says there’s one thing Christians can do. “I just see a lot of anger, and it’s erupting across the nation. And you know, it’s not in one location, but it’s nationwide, there’s something that has happened. So I think Christians need to take the lead and saying, Hey, I’m going to be a peacemaker. We need to do what the scripture says, to be transformed by the renewing of our mind. And that’s a renewal, a revival of our heart of our mind about thinking.”

As the nation mourns this violence, Tippit encourages listeners to pray for a work of the Holy Spirit in the United States. “We just desperately need a revival. And I’m not talking about a revival that makes this political group the best, or the other political group the highest, or who wins. I think we just need a revival. We need to see the Lord in our country. That’s the kind of revival I’m talking about, that we need in America. And it needs to begin with the Church. That doesn’t mean that instantly we’re not going to have these problems, because these problems are very widespread right now.”

Header Image by Juliette Kober from Pixabay.