Tip's Travels: Cock Pit

“Sometimes I am God. If I say someone dies, he dies that same day."
Pablo Escobar 

Pablo Escobar was the former head of the Medellin, Colombia drug cartel and often referred to as the "World's Greatest Outlaw." Many say he was the most elusive cocaine trafficker ever to have lived. In 1987, Forbes magazine estimated Escobar to be the seventh-richest man in the world with a personal wealth of close to US$25 billion while his Medellin cartel controlled 80% of the global cocaine market. It has been said he spent $2500 per month on rubber bands to hold all his “dirty money.” 

I just returned last week from the city of Fusagasuga, Colombia where there is a chicken fighting coliseum with seating capacity for over a thousand people. Frequently, Escobar would spend up to three weeks there, fighting cocks, getting drunk, and giving out money to the poor. 

In that same “Cock Pit” which is now our Every Nation Church, we housed and trained leaders from Bogota, Igabe and Fusagasuga in evangelism with the Two Minute Miracle, One Verse Evangelism, and the God Test. Because of generous missionaries from the past, it now has sleeping capacity for up to eighty people, including sixteen triple-decker bunk beds, a full kitchen, and eleven showers. 

Our vision to have intensive trainings for future pastors, leaders, church planters, and world changers just took a giant step forward. None of the 60 leaders we spent the week training, including our pastor from Fusagasuga, had ever preached the Gospel to “a stranger,” but by the end of the first day, were confidently engaging what turned out to be hundreds on the passing streets, leading many to a new relationship to Christ. It was so exciting to see their confidence to engage their culture with the Gospel growing right before our very eyes.

Ten Days Tip