About

OUR VISION


New Hope exists to extend and multiply healing to wounded hearts. 

OUR MISSION


To equip and empower those who have received comfort from God to comfort others by forming reproducible healing communities in which people walk the healing journey together.

WHO WE ARE


In November of 2017, seven people met together to respond to the need for a holistic and reproducing trauma healing program. Drawing from church planting/multiplication strategies, trauma counselling, and orality, we developed New Hope: Multiplying Healing to Wounded Hearts to address peoples’ past trauma.

We began with the question: “Is it possible that a hurting person could come to a place where (like Joseph in the Bible) they can say, ‘Do not be afraid. You meant to harm me, but God used what has happened for good — not just for me — but so that many other people could be saved’”?

The result was New Hope. New Hope recognizes that full healing cannot be achieved at the end of just a few sessions. Therefore, New Hope strives to not only address hurting hearts, but create the structure necessary for ongoing healing communities.

WHAT WE DO


We believe that it’s not only possible to multiply healing through the broken-hearted themselves, but essential in places where professional help is almost non-existent or based on a model that doesn’t speak to the needs of those hurting. 

This is a biblical pattern. God, the source of immeasurable comfort, comforts us sothatwe can comfort others who are suffering.

The New Hope groups are small, around four to six people, in order to allow participants to tell their stories of hurt in a safe environment. New Hope passes on trauma healing information and tools through experiential learning and oral communication to help participants process information effectively. In a New Hope group, people with heart wounds can move towards healing while experiencing community, developing a sense of purpose, and increasing their faith by learning more about who God is and how to care for themselves and others who have been hurt.

New Hope does not intend to take the place of professional counseling, but rather equips lay people to draw from God’s immeasurable comfort, listen well to those who are hurting, and respond to pain in appropriate ways informed by God’s Word.  

Since November 2017, our team has trained over 600 (over 250 people are from within the IMB) people in New Hope across four continents. Reproducing groups have formed everywhere from refugee camps to nonprofits and church ministries. 

HOW WE DO IT


As an oral program, New Hope bases its teaching in God’s redemptive stories told chronologically and experiential learning. People who have survived traumatic experiences, whether literate or not, respond more effectively in an oral environment than a text-based one. New Hope takes this into account by presenting and processing information in an oral format and learning environment.

As a program based in Biblical principles, New Hope understands that unaddressed trauma creates barriers to hearing, understanding, and accepting the love of God. In other words, trauma can keep someone from truly hearing the gospel or, for those who are believers, trauma creates barriers to spiritual growth. 

Those concerned with sharing the gospel and planting healthy reproducing churches must give significant attention to trauma. We must equip and empower lay people with the basic tools they need to address trauma safely, responsibly, and effectively. As lay people learn these tools, healing can multiply along with the Good News!