WEA

According to WEA International Council Secretary Bruce Clemenger, the WEA's governing body had "unanimously" decided to offer Tunnicliffe another five-year term during a meeting this past Wednesday.

"With gratefulness to God for Geoff Tunnicliffe's leadership to the WEA as International Director for the past 5 years, the International Council (IC) is pleased to announce that Geoff has accepted an offer to extend his term of service until 2015," Clemenger stated on behalf of the 13-member council.

Adding to that, the Rev. Dr. Sang-Bok "David" Kim, chairman of the IC, said: "WEA IC thoroughly evaluated his past performance as International Director with regards to his strengths and weaknesses and felt that divine blessings have been upon him during the last five years of his leadership."

"He moved WEA forward and upward significantly in all areas of the WEA ministry. He is a man of the hour for WEA," Kim added. "We are very happy to reappoint him as WEA International Director for another five years. During the next term of service, we are expecting greater progress in the WEA network and the expansion of God's Kingdom because of his superb leadership."

Tunnicliffe had been elected to lead the WEA in May 2005 after serving for weeks as the alliance's interim international coordinator. Prior to that, Tunnicliffe was serving as director of global initiatives in the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada, a WEA member alliance.

Under Tunnicliffe, the WEA has welcomed into its constituency a number of evangelical groups, including the Council of Evangelical Churches in the Holy Land (CECHL, Christian Council of Korea, the Kosovo Protestant Evangelical Church (KPEC) and the Evangelical Alliance of Azerbaijan. The WEA has also launched a number of new projects, including an initiative on peace-building and reconciliation, a task force on human trafficking, and a leadership institute to meet the leadership development needs of WEA's 126 national alliances.

Presently, the WEA ties together more than 420 million evangelical Christians through its membership, which comprises churches in 128 nations and over 100 international organizations. The alliance's mission is to foster Christian unity and provide a worldwide identity, voice and platform to Evangelical Christians.

Regarding the International Council's request to extend his term, Tunnicliffe said: "I am deeply honored and humbled by the request of the International Council to extend my term as International Director for another 5 years."

"It is a great privilege for me serve the worldwide WEA family in the cause of the Gospel," he added. "I accept this role with a deep awareness for the need of God's grace and wisdom and the prayers of Christians from around the globe. As I look to the next number of years, it is my hope that WEA will continue to grow and become even more effective as a catalyst for Christian unity and the transformation of the nations."

Tunnicliffe was recently in South Korea for the annual meeting of the WEA's International Leadership Team. He will be in China for approximately one week, starting Monday.

World Evangelical Alliance is made up of 128 national evangelical alliances located in 7 regions and 104 associate member organizations. The vision of WEA is to extend the Kingdom of God by making disciples of all nations and by Christ-centered transformation within society. WEA exists to foster Christian unity, to provide an identity, voice and platform for the 420 million evangelical Christians worldwide.