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Who
Are the Rowes?
Bill and Dr.
Julisa Rowe are artist missionaries with Artists in Christian
Testimony. Our passion is to see culturally appropriate drama,
music and worship expressed in churches throughout the world.
Julisa's focus is on cross-cultural drama and Bill works in the
area of music and worship.
Bill was born and raised
in southern
California. From a broken home, he found Christ after high
school, through the witness of friends. He has a
Bachelor’s in Trumpet Performance from Cal State Fullerton,
and a Master of Church Music from Western Seminary. He has
toured with the Continental Singers, in the orchestra and as
an Assistant Director, and has played trumpet for ministries and
general events throughout Portland. For five years he served
as worship leader and planner at Faith Baptist Church, and now
participates in the worship team at their church, Montavilla Baptist.
Julisa was
born in Zimbabwe, the daughter of Dr. and Mrs. Donald K. Smith,
missionaries in Africa for 30 years and now teaching at
Western Seminary. She received Christ into her life
as a young child. She took her BA at Westmont College in
Theatre Arts and English, and has an MA in Intercultural Ministries and
the Doctor of Missiology from Western Seminary. She met Bill
in Los Angeles while working for ACT. They married in 1990
and have two children, Kendall and Nathaniel.
They spent
the whole of 2001 in Kenya, teaching at Daystar University
(drama and music) and working with Nairobi Baptist, directing the
choir, working with the drama teams and researching drama
forms. They also spent four months in Madras, India,
researching the dramas of that area
Making
Disciples Around the World Using Drama, Music and Worship
We…
• help Christians grow deeper in their walk,
having a more
vital, vibrant worship of God, resulting in drawing unbelievers into
the journey toward Christ-discipleship
• perform for outreach and teaching (evangelistic events,
church conferences, worship services, etc.)
• affirm people in their own culture and way of expression,
because the indigenous culture is the best way to communicate.
• train church planters in culturally-effective arts and
worship
• work in partnership with national church leaders/ workers,
developing indigenous worship and drama for effective discipleship
• train others to continue the training and discipleship
process within their own areas of influence
We are moving our base to Nairobi, Kenya, with continuing work in the
U.S. and India, with shorter trips to many other countries.
The
bulk of our time, however, will be spent in East
Africa.
We are missionaries under Artists
in Christian Testimony, a non-denominational artistic
missions organization.
Kenya: working with Nairobi Baptist Church in their drama and
music ministry, and teaching at Daystar University, training current
and future leaders from around the continent of Africa in the use of
drama and music (particularly their own indigenous forms) for teaching
and outreach.
India: working with national church-planters, reaching into
the
Hindu community and utilizing Indian drama for outreach and teaching.
The ends of the earth: Singapore, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Trinidad
and
many more countries have requested our help in making effective
disciples using drama, music and worship. Training and
performing
will also continue in the United States.
The Rowes have been working in drama and music ministry with local
churches throughout the West Coast since 1989.
Julisa’s
work includes networking drama groups together for unification of
purpose and mutual encouragement, teaching workshops on acting,
directing, philosophy of drama in the church, and coordinating drama
conferences, retreats, and workshops. In addition to this,
she
performs one-woman shows, coordinates, directs and performs with sketch
teams to demonstrate the use of drama in the church, and directed drama
at her church, Faith Baptist for 9 years. She is now on the
leadership team for drama at Montavilla Baptist. She has been
adjunct faculty at Western Seminary, teaching drama. She has
also
taken several courses in international drama, and focused her doctoral
work on the area of ethnodramatology and how it applies to missions and
ministry. Travels in 35 countries and work with
international students have helped expand her knowledge in this area.
Performances:
click here for a list of our performances and dramatic worship services
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