About

Manny Fernandez lay in his hospital bed not knowing who he was, where he was, or even what language he spoke. He had just been in a severe bicycle accident with a car, but the Lord, having bigger plans for him, spared his life and helped him recover.

At this pivotal point in his life, Manny came to understand that tomorrow is no guarantee. ‘That’s why I began to share the Gospel with everybody!’ To this day, Manny, a Multnomah, alumnus, remains devoted to spreading the Gospel to people around the world by training and deploying church planters through his agency, World Link Ministries. ‘TRAIN AND DEPLOY IS WHAT WE SEE AS THE GREAT COMMISSION.’

What began as the Spanish Seminary for Theological and Evangelistic Training (SEFOVAN) in Madrid, Spain, founded by Manny in 1991, quickly became World Link Ministries just two years later.

Headquartered in Irving, Texas, World Link isn’t focused on training Americans to become missionaries to other countries. World Link trains ministers and seminary students from all across the world, equipping them with a solid, biblical foundation, and deploying them to plant churches in their own communities.

“The strategy is reaching the countries from the inside out,” Manny said. “I believe it’s probably God’s next wave in the missionary enterprise: energizing the troops from within to reach their countries for Christ.”

Manny believes the best method of reaching a country for Christ is to use trained nationals to plant churches. Often times, World Link will partner with nearby seminaries, recruiting students who share their heart for church planting and evangelism.

The Lord’s blessing on World Link Ministries is plain to see. What began as a fatal bicycle accident became a tool God used to inspire action. When Manny Fernandez and his family first began their overseas ministry in Spain, they thought that two or three church plants would have fulfilled their commission. But God had bigger plans for Manny.

Currently, World Link’s goal is to finish planting 10,000 churches within the next ten years. Using the train and deploy strategy. Ambitious? Certainly. But as the Lord has proven to Manny time and again, He is capable of spreading His Church in miraculous ways.

(From the Inside Out by David Hardy Multnomah SUMMER 2008 Volume 10 Number 2)