by Doug Lucas, President of Team Expansion
Welcome to the first issue merging two existing publications, the Team Expansion NEWS and the Visionary newsletter.
Fort Benning is a 182,000-acre US Army base straddling the Alabama-Georgia border. Military strategists refer to it as a “power projection platform,” meaning that it serves a vital role for our armed forces related to training, strategy, and staging the deployment of our global peacekeeping forces. Honestly, until my son deployed to Fort Benning, I had never thought about a piece of land as a part of a global military strategy. Military strategy involved army tanks, missiles and gunfire. But I came to appreciate the value of a training base like Fort Benning. Thanks in to their imagination, determination, and wisdom, Fort Benning, and other power project platform components like it, have helped the USA create one of the greatest standing armies in the history of the world.
Ephesians 6:12 describes a spiritual struggle, not unlike an all-out military battle. “Our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.” Visionaries with great wisdom have urged church leaders and members of our day to create training venues on a SPIRITUAL basis with Fort-Benning-like power projection capability for the Kingdom of our Lord. In 2003, Team Expansion’s Leadership Task Force (i.e., our board of directors) began just that quest in earnest.
Today, Emerald Hills is active as a training base, offering a missionary candidate preparation school three times each year, as well as multiple other trainings, including prayer weekends, church missions mobilization courses, disciple making movement trainings and more. In addition, Emerald Hills houses Team Expansion’s International Services team, which scouts out unique new mission opportunities on a global scale, shepherds our 300 full-time missionaries in over 40 countries, and maintains Team Expansion’s status with federal and state governments.
We are thankful for those who invest in making Emerald Hills into a spiritual power projection platform for today and for the future. May God help Emerald Hills be a tool in accomplishing His will for good and for global Kingdom growth. And may He reign forever in the hearts of those who serve him both at Emerald Hills and around the globe.
Emerald Hills December Financial Report