Among an Isolated People

In the mid-sixties, we (Richard & Connie Smith) began our ministry among an isolated jungle tribe in Colombia.

We were the first outsiders to live and witness among this stone-age people.

We analyzed the language, created an alphabet and literacy materials, provided for the medical needs of the tribe and did some community development—introduced chickens, corn, etc.

We also translated portions of the Old and New Testaments before being called to Ethiopia. Several years later another team took over and the New Testament has been completed.

Stone Age: These people have forgotten that there even was a God—Had no system of right or wrong, instead had a Taboo system. Jesus died for our sins, not our taboos.

In the Gospel presentation we needed to stress “Being in God’s Family”—not sin—since they would not acknowledge their sins.

AFTER receiving the Lord they acknowledged that Jesus had paid for their sins when they gave their testimonies—shows the work of the Holy Spirit.

Under the National Church

After eleven years God directed us to Ethiopia where we served under the national church training and directing Christians from the Haddiyya and Kambata tribes in translating the Scriptures into these languages.

These nationals completed the two New Testaments in 1993 and in 2012 the entire Bible was dedicated in these two Cushitic languages.

Old Testament culture: Two tribes, one and ½ million and several hundred small congregations. Mix of pagan and Christian and Christians were only 2nd generation.

Scriptures were in Amharic (not a Cushitic language) and were often not understood so there was misunderstanding and miss- application. This experience helped reinforce the importance of the Old Testament for understanding the New Testament.

Training and Consulting

In the mid eighties we were asked to prepare and run an on-site training program for Christian workers and candidates. For six years we did so as a Semester Abroad Program in a “closed country” in North Africa, under stressful, potentially dangerous conditions.

The program was accredited by Biola University and William Carey International University through the Ph.D. level.

During these years we sought to show that /entry programs/were vital in giving supervision, support and guidance to people when they first enter a new culture.

We focused on:

1. Providing discovery and on-going learning tools for more effective ways of communicating the Gospel across culture, in dynamic ways, to any target people;
2. Creating greater sensitivity to the guiding of the Holy Spirit;
3. Strengthening the spiritual, emotional and mental powers of the individual Christian worker and
4. Learning within experience (without books) so that the implications and applications of lessons learned in real life can be seen and even passed on to others.

Prayer Resolution

During the Semester Abroad Program, as we sought to equip Christian workers spiritually and academically, we began to encounter Prayer Resolution needs.

At first it appeared that the need for Prayer Resolution was a result of the extremely stressful training program but this was only partly true. This became more apparent when, in the late eighties, we were asked to evaluate a mission’s work in the Middle East and North Africa.

Though our task was to evaluate the work on the fields we were asked also to run brief training seminars and to share from our mission experience. As we shared about the Prayer Resolution needs of new believers coming out of Muslim, and pagan backgrounds, the workers began to ask for Prayer Resolution for themselves.

At first we focused just on the forgiveness process and then as issues came up we had to recognize cleansing and occult issues, etc.

We also tended to emphasize the need of new converts to get Prayer Resolution. For example, in North Africa there are a lot of low-key occult activities that need to be handled (and usually aren’t).

When we shared with a group of about 50 workers in Israel about the needs of new converts, most of the workers came forward wanting to deal with their pasts and recognizing how their pasts were affecting their ministries.

Cross Resources

We began to realize no matter how equipped spiritually, academically or culturally Christian workers were, if there were issues in their past that had not been dealt with, Satan would use these things to keep them unhappy, dissatisfied and as ineffective as possible; relationships with God, family, colleagues and nationals all suffered. And thus was born Cross Ministries. In 1990, because of the sensitive nature of this ministry, we took service leave from the Wycliffe Bible Translators and affiliated ourselves with Guidelines International Ministries. We continued to be available for the on-site training of workers overseas, for workshops and seminars on

communicating the Gospel across cultures and for workshops and seminars on Prayer Resolution and spiritual warfare.

In 1996 we moved from Arizona to Bland, Virginia where we resided on 13 acres in the mountains. In January 1997 Cross Ministries was incorporated as a non-profit 501(c)(3) religious organization with a five-member board of directors and with us (Connie and Richard Smith) as the only full time staff.

In the Prayer Resolution approach is valid, it should work with all people, regardless of their culture, using the same principals but with cultural adjustments.

Here are some of the countries/cultures/people where Prayer Resolution has been used in ministry by the Smiths or by others: Austria, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Chad, China, Congo, Ecuador, Egypt, El Salvador, England, France, Germany, Ireland, Israel, Kenya, Korea, Mauritania, Mexico, The Netherlands, Niger, Philippines, Senegal, Siberia, Sierra Leone, Switzerland, Taiwan, and from many parts of the United States.

Initially, Cross Resources did not charge for Prayer Resolution sessions since this ministry is an essential part of the Gospel, which is free, thus the ministry continues to be dependent on the prayers, support and gifts of concerned Christians.

Now, however, Cross Resources encourages those who have been helped through Prayer Resolution to give a one-time contribution for the services rendered and, hopefully, to become regular contributors since gifts from supporters are not enough to cover living costs of any us who are ministering full-time.

We did not want to create another organization but we did not fit into the structure of Wycliffe (They had a counseling department and a pastoral department—we fit in both and neither). At first we were seconded by Wycliffe to Guidelines but then the GL board was afraid of the possible liability linked to our particular ministry so they gave us 90 days to “do something” so we were forced to incorporate!

We incorporated in Virginia as Cross Ministries, Inc.; when we sold the Bland property we dissolved the corporation in Virginia. Because the CM name was already in use, the corporation was incorporated in the state of Georgia as Cross Resources, Inc. Also Cross Resources is not as overtly Christian so helpful in communicating with people in sensitive countries.

The Cross Resources office is currently in Tempe, Arizona while we currently reside in Palm Bay, Florida.