Today we’d like to introduce you to Andrea Taylor
Hi Andrea, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
Pais Movement was founded in 1992 by Paul Gibbs. He went into schools and was inspired to start a missions movement across the world that focuses on reaching lost kids in schools and disciplining them to reach their world.
Pais USA is a branch of the Pais Movement in the United States. Its headquarters is in Arlington, TX, and it is led by Kirby and Drea Taylor.
Kirby and Drea met while serving on Pais Brazil in 2016. They immediately shared a love for Jesus, mission, and discipleship. They started dating in 2017 and got married in 2018.
Kirby decided to work in other jobs while Drea worked for the Pais Headquarters. However, the Lord directed Kirby to disciple the next generation, and he rejoined Pais in 2022. Now, the Taylors lead Pais USA with a strong vision of empowering Gen Z to share their faith and hope to put a Pais team in every city across the USA to reach students in schools.
I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
Pais has always gone against the mainstream in terms of ministry and vision. When we share the Gospel, we say that God did not just come to rescue them but to recruit them to advance His Kingdom.
Also, the missionaries who join Pais are offered free housing, accommodation, transportation, meals, and training. This makes our model less lucrative, and we depend on the local church to fund teams and find host homes.
Our struggles are that our vision can be misunderstood because it is not a standard way of doing ministry, and churches don’t have willing host families or the finances to pay for the Pais team. Also, The Taylors lived with a family for a season while they raised a personal financial support team because they wanted to be uncompromised in leading Pais USA, regardless of finances.
Pais USA has been in a pruning season, but it has led to a lot of healthy growth and they are beginning to see a lot of students being reached, disciples and sent.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
Pais is known for the work inside of schools. We have curated lessons that could apply to any age and audience. We bring hope into a classroom. Our lessons focus on developing their character, loving others, following their dreams, forgiveness, and overcoming peer pressure.
It is the bread and butter of our work, and students look forward to seeing the Pais team in their class. Pais serves in any middle or high school to encourage any socioeconomic group, race, religion, or gender. We are proud that we can come in and change the culture of classrooms. While Pais is a Christian organization, we do not proselytize in the schools, but we hope that our love for God can shine through our lessons.
We’re always looking for the lessons that can be learned in any situation, including tragic ones like the Covid-19 crisis. Are there any lessons you’ve learned that you can share?
Pais faced many challenges during the lockdown. Since we couldn’t go to schools, we needed to be more creative in the way we reached people.
We began to develop the Pais Youth Academy, which is a program students can join to learn how to share their faith, lead Bible studies, and disciple others. We piloted the Pais Youth Academy during COVID-19, which required us to put all our teaching resources online.
Now that we are back in schools, we can lean on our online resources and reach more students!
Pricing:
- Training, transport, food and housing are provided during a Pais Apprenticeship
- You fundraise for your phone bill, travel to the destination, spending money, and health related costs.
- Church Partners in the USA pay around $20,000 a year for a team of 4-5 missionaries
Contact Info:
- Website: https://paismovement.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/paisusa/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PaisUSA
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@paismovement
