Long-term vision a reality

We are excited to share our report on our recent teaching projects as we are more pleased than ever about what is happening in some of our training locations.

One of our main goals has been to raise up teams of trainers that would catch the vision of taking the lessons we bring and teaching them in other venues. This has happened over the years with perhaps one or two people continuing the teaching. However, after the 2014 publication of the Teaching Leadership manual, we have had teams join together to take the training. This has been our dream.

In March of this year we trained five men in Myanmar in the use of the new material. They caught the vision. Two of those men have already conducted seminars in the northern regions of their country. Two others are teaching the material in their bible college classes

In June, Bob went to Sierra Leone in West Africa where he met with five men who had shown interest in developing a teaching team. We spent three days in training on the new material. Then, these men taught the new lessons in a three-day seminar with over ninety church leaders present. Following that meeting we met for a debrief session in which all five men committed to working together to teach leaders in their country, with the possibility of going into some of the surrounding nations. One of the team members has begun translating Uncommon Leadership into French so that it can be distributed throughout West Africa. These five men have already taught their first seminar in an outlying province and have two more scheduled. One of the men is traveling to meet leaders to set up other training opportunities.

In July, Bob, joined by Peggy and our grandson Andrew, met with five Malawi men, four of whom have been doing leadership seminars, and a three-man training team from Zimbabwe who joined them in Malawi. It was great to get these two teams together so that they can network and share experiences. The eight men spent three days in a training session and then taught a three-day seminar to forty-six church leaders from central Malawi.

The next week, Bob traveled with three Malawians to lead a three-day seminar in northern Malawi for seventy church leaders. The response to the lessons was so great that the Malawi team will travel a second time to the north; this time they will train a three-man team to do training in the northern third of the country.

As you can see, what we have hoped and prayed for the past several years is beginning to happen!