Ed Silvoso

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Ed Silvoso
Born (1945-06-15) June 15, 1945 (age 79)
San Nicolás de los Arroyos, Argentina
Occupation(s)Author, documentarian, evangelist
Known forHarvest Evangelism
International Transformation Network

Ed Silvoso (born June 15, 1945) is an Argentine New Apostolic Reformation evangelist, author, and documentarian. He founded Harvest Evangelism and the Transform Our World Network, the objective of which is to end worldwide systemic poverty in its four expressions. [1] He was a leader in the Argentine Revival during the 1990s, a pioneer in the spiritual mapping movement, and is a formative figure in the modern transformation movement. [2] Silvoso has hosted conferences, participated in symposiums, provided leadership training, and appeared in the media. [3] [4] [5] He has published six books and produced a documentary library of over forty titles.

Contents

Early ministry

Ed Silvoso was born at San Nicolás de los Arroyos, Argentina. He is the son of Omar Edmundo Silvoso and Maria Teresa Troia and has a younger sister, Maria Rosa. He formed an evangelistic team at the age of seventeen when the country was intensely anti-evangelical. [6] He graduated from Colegio Nacional Justo Jose de Urquiza in 1962; [7] seven years later he became a pastor in Mar del Plata, Argentina. [8] Silvoso married Ruth Noemi Palau, the sister of evangelist Luis Palau, on April 20, 1968, and they have four daughters.

He attended Multnomah Bible College in Portland, Oregon, and later moved to Pasadena, California, to continue his studies at Fuller Seminary. Silvoso began working with Luis Palau as part of Overseas Crusades in 1970 as coordinator for International Mass Media Evangelism (1970–1976). [9] He was full-time with Palau's evangelistic team (1977–1980) before founding Harvest Evangelism. [10]

Career

He established Harvest Evangelism at San Jose, California, in 1980; it is now known as Transform Our World (TOW). While this ministry pioneered city transformation, [11] its initial influence was the result of efforts in Resistencia, Argentina. [12] [13]

The same approach was applied to more than three hundred cities, and it expanded to six continents. [14] Silvoso began to host international conferences that promoted local, regional, and national change through ecumenical ministry. [15] [16] He was a pioneer in the spiritual mapping movement beginning in the mid-1980s, in which adherents map out the spiritual history and social factors of a region to determine the demon (territorial spirit) controlling it and preventing evangelism, in order to defeat it through prayer. He and a number of other pastors at a Harvest Evangelism conference noted a lack of Evangelical churches in an area of Argentina, and determining it was caused by a demon controlling the area through a local warlock, used spiritual warfare methods to "take back" the area for God. He would then go on to organize Plan Resistencia, a testing ground for the new spiritual mapping methods, which "brought together into one system notions such as spiritual warfare, evangelism, territorial spirits, breaking and binding of spirits, identificational repentance, Spiritual Mapping, prayer marches and newly developed strategic-level spiritual warfare terms". [13]

The lessons learned from Silvoso's community transformation efforts were shared in his first book, That None Should Perish: How to Reach Entire Cities for Christ through Prayer Evangelism (1994). The concepts in this volume inspired the Transform Our World Network, a voluntary association that creates alliances between local marketplaces and various faith-based assemblies. [17]

Members are challenged to invest their resources to help eradicate systemic poverty in its four aspects. This theme is broadened in Prayer Evangelism: How to Change the Spiritual Climate Over Your Home, Neighborhood and City (2000) and Anointed for Business (2002). [18] Five paradigms are at the core of TOW, and they involve changes in spiritual climate, public policies, and ecclesiastical institutions. [19]

Silvoso is an acknowledged leader of the Argentine Revival, [20] [21] and thousands in the United States have observed his methodology over the past thirty years, both clergy and laity. [22] [23] As a result, they have adopted his approach to transformation, a process that affects the marketplace as well as the church. [24]

Books

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References

  1. ↑ Silvoso, Ed. Transformation. pp. 28–29.
  2. ↑ Jane Rumph identified Ed Silvoso as a brilliant Argentine strategist, "Engaging the Enemy in Resistencia". The Rising Revival. p. 144., and acknowledges that Plan Resistencia became a prototype for citywide evangelism applied around the world, pp. 144–145, 156.
  3. ↑ "Ed Silvoso Urges Cincinnati to Change Marketplace and Nation Though Prayer". SF Gate . March 17, 2011.[ dead link ]
  4. ↑ "Ed Silvoso Urges Cincinnati to Change Marketplace and Nation Through..." NewGuide.us. March 17, 2011. Archived from the original on November 14, 2011.
  5. ↑ "Ed Silvoso to Speak at AWOP Faith Forward Event". The Cincinnati Herald . February 2, 2011.[ dead link ]
  6. ↑ Sanchez, Sheila (July 21, 2005). "God at Work". Weekly Almaden Times. Archived from the original on December 2, 2008.
  7. ↑ "Argentinian Evangelist at Community Church". Hesperia Resorter. July 20, 1972.
  8. ↑ "Personal Story". edsilvoso.com.
  9. ↑ "Book Review: That None Should Perish". Dehoney Center for Urban Ministry Training.[ dead link ]
  10. ↑ Stanton, Noel (September 25, 1999). "Talking to Ed Silvoso". Jesus Life.
  11. ↑ Choy, Jeremy (January–March 2007). "Ed Silvoso's Transformation Conference 2006". Harvest Times. No. 30. Archived from the original on November 20, 2008.
  12. ↑ Holvast, René (2008). Spiritual Mapping in the United States and Argentina, 1989–2005: A Geography of Fear. The Netherlands: Brill Academic Publishers. p. 314.
  13. 1 2 Holvast, René (2008). Spiritual Mapping: The Turbulent Career of a Contested American Missionary Paradigm, 1989–2005 (PDF) (Thesis). Utrecht University. pp. 40–44, 61. ISBN   978-90-393-4829-1 . Retrieved September 15, 2024.
  14. ↑ Logelin, Inger J. (December 27, 2010). "Transformation: What Sets the Argentina Revival Apart?". In the Workplace. Archived from the original on December 27, 2010.
  15. ↑ Riss, Richard M. (October 15, 1995). "A History of the Worldwide Awakening of 1992–1995" (11th ed.). Archived from the original on November 17, 2000.
  16. ↑ Deiros, Pablo A. "The Roots and Fruits of the Argentine Revival". The Rising Revival. p. 30.
  17. ↑ Spiritual Transformers in the Marketplace
  18. ↑ Silvoso, Ed. "Ministry in the Marketplace". Ministry in the Marketplace. Archived from the original on June 24, 2006.
  19. ↑ Bright, Bill (2000). Foreword to Prayer Evangelism: How to Change the Spiritual Climate Over Your Home, Neighborhood and City. Ventura, California: Regal Press.
  20. ↑ Wagner, C. Peter. Simpson, Chris; Little, David (eds.). "The Awesome Argentina Revival—Lessons in Evangelism and Spiritual Warfare from Argentina". Archived from the original on February 10, 2002.
  21. ↑ Wagner, C. Peter; Deiros, Pablo, eds. (1998). "Unleashing the Headwaters of Revival". The Rising Revival: Firsthand Accounts of the Incredible Argentine Revival—and How It Can Spread throughout the World. Ventura, California: Renew. pp. 202–204, 207–216.
  22. ↑ MacHarg, Kenneth D. (1999). "Argentine Evangelicals Buoyed by Rally, Growth in Spirit and Numbers". Christian Citizen. Dayton, Ohio. LAM News Service.
  23. ↑ Encuesta conicet sobre creencia (PDF), 2008
  24. ↑ "Five Star Evangelist". Re. No. 14. June 2011. pp. 13–18.
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