On a busy corner in Guadalajara, Mexico, the scent of fresh bread beckons pedestrians into a rustic bakery.  Once inside, however, the pleasing aroma of Christ draws customers to the bakery's mother and daughter owner-operators, Myriam and Adriana Sanchez.

Rogenbrott was founded in 2014 as a missional enterprise to share Christ among the lost.  The Sanchez family had a dream of starting a business where they could use their God-given talents as bakers, provide for their economic needs, and share Christ with others.  That is what is happening as God is fulfilling their daily prayer of “Lord, let us be a fragrant scent here; may You be who attends to the true needs of our clients and providers.”

The bakery sells homemade artisan bread to the community, and its impact is felt daily.  Clients come in to purchase bread, and are charmed by the family who naturally shares Christ with them.  Clients have learned that they can find a listening ear and someone who will pray for them.  One client loves coming into the shop because she admires their peace and joy.  When asked how they could always be so joyous, mom and daughter responded that it is Christ in them. 

The bakery's providers are also being reached with the Gospel.  Over the past year, the Sanchez family has developed a relationship with one supplier.  Although he comes from a religious family, he didn´t understand the Gospel.  The Sanchez family believes in making Jesus known through their daily lives, so it wasn´t long before their provider asked them to pray for his sick relative.  They rejoiced together when the relative was restored to health.   After, their new friend began to come to them for counsel, and they began studying God´s Word with him.  The Sanchezes hope that this is just the first of many who will come to know Jesus as their Savior because of the bread store dedicated to the Lord.

The Gospel is being lived out in this bakery,  and the pleasing aroma of Christ is fragrant to all.  Will you take a moment and pray for this missional business, for the Sanchez family, and for other businesses serving to make Christ known around the world?  “For we are the aroma of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing.”  (2 Corinthians 2:15 ESV)

– GEN Desk Contributing Author

By JACK BENJAMIN 

I will never forget the moment 24-years ago when Aldo Berndt, the Latin America Regional Director at that time and a man for whom I have deep respect, made this stunning comment: 

“It is cruel to talk about the Great Commission in two-thirds of the world.” 

“How could that be?” I thought to myself. “The Great Commission is the reason my wife and I just moved to Colombia with our three young children!” 

After Aldo’s bold statement, he saw my distress. So with a gentle smile, Aldo went on to clarify. When fully funded gift-income missionaries launch a new work with the hope of reproducing and sending out laborers, those new laborers often don’t have the funding capacity or time to replicate what the missionary had modeled. 

The consequence is that future generations of laborers may become discouraged and end up giving the work of the ministry to the “full-time” workers. 

“If we want to see nations reached for Christ,” Aldo went on to say, “we must offer the majority of people a different model, one that is more realistic and replicable in their context.”

Since that time, Navigators in Latin America have been taking strategic initiatives in response to the challenge that their Regional Director articulated. For example, Jimmy Payton had started a leather goods manufacturing and export business in Bogotá, named Tenazcol. Employees, customers and suppliers—all those relating in some way with Tenazcol—saw that this business was different. They heard the Gospel message and saw it in action. Many were irresistibly drawn to Christ and followed Him. 

The daily opportunity for Jimmy to work side-by-side with his staff proved to be an ideal arrangement for life-on-life discipleship. Some of those employees were discipled well and have gone on to lead the next generation in Colombia. 

A decade later, Jimmy and Roberto Blauth (from Brazil), who were serving in Aguascalientes, Mexico, began a construction business called Casas Mas that provided low-cost homes to the community. As with Tenazcol, Casas Mas became a place where life-on-life discipleship and the Scriptures combined with God’s Spirit to make Jesus real to many. 

It wasn’t long before a vibrant community of faith grew up in Aguascalientes and, energized by Casas Mas, contributed significantly to a new generation of laborers in Mexico. The word spread and a number of emerging laborers from around Latin America chose to intern in Casas Mas and serve in the Aguascalientes work as part of their ministry training. Today most of them are laboring fruitfully around the region.

In recent years, a group of Navigator alumni who are successful Mexican professionals, including a former Casas Mas general manager, have come together to launch a new generation of missional enterprises like Tenazcol and Casas Mas. United by this passion, they provide mentoring, subject matter expertise, whole-life discipling and funding to aspiring missional entrepreneurs—people who can serve as Gospel pioneers in other nations.

The Navigators have been involved with missional enterprises for more than three decades. Each of the seven regions in the Worldwide Partnership has missional enterprise initiatives as part of their overall strategy to advance the Navigator calling. Such enterprises help not only to gain access to closed or hard-to-reach places, but also to establish credibility with the local community in which they are operating.

Please pray that God will continue to lead our leaders to work together to start and sustain missional enterprises that truly fulfill our calling. 

You can watch a short video about Jimmy and Roberto in Aguascalientes below.

Jack Benjamin is director of the Global Enterprise Network for our Worldwide Partnership.