Programs : Church Empowerment

The backbone of ICM’s work among the poor is its commitment to work with local church congregations within each slum. ICM’s programs are offered to communities through the leadership of local congregations. ICM recognizes that the problems faced by the poor are complex. When a person suffers severe financial, medical or family crisis, it is inevitable that they will also experience emotional and spiritual problems as well. As a part of ICM’s commitment to the poor, ICM dedicates itself to building up the local church congregation, in order to empower them to counsel, support and minister to the needs of those who receive other kinds of help from ICM. ICM has several programs which help build up the local church so that they can better share God’s love and grace with their communities.

Counselor Training

Before beginning any program within a slum, ICM provides training courses for pastors and their church members in the Biblical instruction and counseling skills necessary to address the needs of those who will be receiving help. These newly trained counselors and pastors are available at every Feeding Program and Open Air Medical Clinic to encourage, answer and pray with those who receive aid.

In addition to specific training, ICM organizes monthly pastors meetings and periodic fellowships at which pastors hear inspirational guest speakers, discuss challenges, celebrate milestones, and exchange information.

In FY 05/06, 254 churches were involved in these Counseling Training Programs. ICM also held eight Instructor Seminars where 289 pastors received instructor’s certification, fifty-one Counselor Seminars where 1,359 church members received counselor’s certification. In addition, 5,157 Feeding Program recipients received counselor’s certification, as well as an additional 1,025 other church members. In total, nearly eight thousand people were certified as either instructors or counselors. Over 12,500 training booklets and pamphlets were provided in four languages (English, Tagalog, Illongo, and Cebrano).

Door-to-Door Feeding

The Door-to-Door Feeding program provides pastors with 30 kilograms of rice each month (for up to 6 months) to distribute to families they visit. In the book of Matthew in the Bible, Jesus gave the church the job of spreading his message of love and grace with the world. It is Philippine church culture for local pastors to visit families in their communities, offering to answer questions and share the Christian message. The Door-to-Door Program also allows pastors to identify needs which may be served by ICM’s programs. Most pastors visit fifteen different families each month, leaving 2 kilos of rice with each family. The families visited are normally not involved in any other ICM program. In FY 05/06, the Door-to-Door Feeding Program reached over 10,000 families in 138 different slums.

Worship Training

The Worship Training Program (known as Touchpoint) aims to equip the local church in the practice of Christian praise and worship. The team teaches worship techniques, new worship songs, and gives tuition in playing musical instruments to musicians and worship leaders who want to improve the praise and worship time in their churches and communities.

Twice a year, large Touchpoint events (Grand Touchpoint in June, and Celebrate Jesus in December) celebrate with thousands of recipients from the previous 6-month Feeding and Medical programs. They include a time of praise and worship, performances by ICM recipient churches, and an evangelical message.

In FY 05/06, 282 regular Touchpoints were conducted for 295 slums, with 13,818 people attending. Twelve large-scale Touchpoint events were conducted, attended by over 21,000 people in total.

Children's Christian Education

The Children’s Christian Education (CE) Program focuses on providing training to local church members in effective teaching techniques. These teachers then conduct children’s Sunday School classes and other classes for children throughout the week. The CE program also provides a resource lending service, allowing teachers to borrow materials to be used when teaching children. Finally, the CE program runs outreach events in the local slum churches. In FY 05/06, 277 teachers were trained and 4,064 outreach events were conducted serving a total of 78,271 adults and children.

Other Outreach Programs

Film Showing and Crusades are outreach programs designed to attract audiences, connect individuals to their local churches, meet immediate spiritual needs of a given population, and bring the urgently needy into contact with ICM.

ICM teams show Christian films in slum areas at a pastor’s request, working to gather crowds to watch the films. After the film a pastor talks about the implications of the film and discusses the hope offered by Christianity. ICM team members connect members of the audience with a local church. Pastors and trained church members contact those requesting follow-up within the following week. In FY 05.06, 150 film shows in 141 slum areas were attended by over 26,000 people.

ICM runs a number of foreign crusades each year, entertaining groups of around twenty overseas visitors (primarily from Hong Kong) to see its programs in action. The visitors travel through the slums to see how the feeding and medical programs work. The trip often culminates with the visitors attending a Grand Touchpoint or Celebrate Jesus event.