Brazil – Technology Development Specialist
World Team Manaus’ vision is to cooperate with the local church in strengthening and multiplying indigenous churches and leaders in the city of Manaus and the surrounding region with the aim of encouraging, mentoring, training, and equipping indigenous church planters to serve in the greater Amazon region.
The Technology Development Specialist will strive to see the gospel established in unengaged and unreached communities in the urban center of Manaus and the surrounding region by providing technical support, education, and tools to the ministry team, indigenous church leaders, and indigenous communities.
The ideal candidate will have a mature walk with the Lord where they continually seek to grow in godliness, abide in Christ, and evangelize and make disciples within their current context. Ideal character traits for this candidate include flexibility, humility, patience, resiliency, interest in other cultures and peoples, and a genuine love for the lost.
The ministry context involves working with populations (or communities) who have a history and current context of discrimination, marginalization, trauma, and extreme poverty, as well as pervasive spiritual warfare. Wisdom and spiritual maturity are vitally important to navigate these challenges.
World Team highly values immersion into the local culture and context. Thus, the ideal candidate must be willing to work hard to learn the local language, worldviews, majority culture, and minority subcultures.
The ideal candidate qualifications are:
- The ability to work on teams, be flexible and be a good team player
- Creativity and ability to “think outside the box”
- A heart for and desire to work with marginalized people groups
- The ability to apply and adapt technological practices to new contexts
- Biblical competency and theological training (formal or informal) with an ability to interpret and communicate Scripture
- A willingness to learn new methods and an ability to adapt methods to different cultural contexts, with the purpose of equipping locals to do the same
- An aptitude to discern between cultural norms and Biblical truths and to address problematic theology in a culturally informed manner
- Experience in developing user-friendly applications and websites
- An interest in developing applications/websites for use in evangelism, discipleship, and training
- An ability or desire to learn how to teach technological content and social media to teammates, local church leaders, and communities
- Knowledge regarding computer and internet security and tech support
- Some experience in social media and graphic design
- An ability to develop and adjust content for oral cultures and low-literacy populations
- An ability to suspend judgment and work in high levels of ambiguity
- A strong knowledge of Microsoft Office applications
- A willingness to learn a level of Portuguese appropriate to their term and responsibilities
The Technology Development Specialist will work on a team to provide mutual encouragement and accountability. They will:
- Establish local relationships, share the gospel in culturally contextualized ways, and make disciples that make disciples
- Identify disciples and connect them to other believers and a local church when possible (facilitating or creating opportunities as needed)
- Promote maturity and healthy Christian living
- Facilitate the training and equipping of local indigenous church leaders regarding the use of technological tools and supports
- Provide technological support and training to teammates
- Take part in field-level activities, including field retreats and conferences, regular business and prayer meetings, and other tasks as needed
- Fulfill administrative requirements as a World Team missionary (may include reporting, bookkeeping, continuing education, professional development, etc.)
- Develop interactive technological content and applications for the use of evangelism and discipleship among the indigenous (as skills apply)
- Assist in team social media and graphic design (as skills apply)
- Research changing trends regarding technology and its implications for church planting, rural Amazonia, and missions (as skills apply)
- Build partnerships with local, national, and international churches and organizations already using tech in ministry in order to share resources (as skills apply)
Other Opportunities Might Include:
- Research changing trends regarding technology and its implications for church planting, rural Amazonia, and missions.