Mid-training update...

OK...so I know it's been quite a while since I last updated this thing. But there's a good reason for that...I didn't actually expect anyone to be reading it before now. Most of ya'll know I'm not a big blog/e-mail person...in fact I pretty much avoid it at all costs. But since I'm now out of touch with most of you folks back home I'll try to get better at this. I won't actually leave for the field for another month so updates until then will be sparing at best. But I promise to be much more frequent once I'm there. So as for what's been going on since I left SC...

The everyday schedule here is fairly busy. We're generally in sessions from 8am to 3pm. Sessions range from the mundane things about insurance, finances, etc to some excellent ones on evangelism tools. I've learned a lot about church planting in the New Testament model. It's amazing that the book of Acts has so much to offer to us today about planting churches. Everything we need is there for us to find. Yet for so long I've looked at it as history and the past and a purely "moral" model. But it's more than that...God gave us a model for literally every aspect of life...and he gave us more than enough on how to plant churches. We may have developed all kinds of techniques and plans and models...but when it comes right down to it we just need to go back to Scripture and see how the first churches in Acts were started.

Another highlight of the time here has been Chronological Bible Storying. I've known for some years now that a large portion of the world are oral learners. But what I didn't understand fully were the levels of literacy. Just because someone is literate does not mean that they are functionally literate. Many can read by sounding out the words but comprehension may not be there. In fact, even if they can be discipled or evangelized through literate means, that may not be the most effective...and additionally this method may not be passed on from generation to generation. Oral methods are universal. So I've recently learned the fine art of storying the Bible...picking certain stories that resonate with ceratain cultures...portraying them as accurately as possible from memory but presenting them in a culturally effective manner. This may actually be more difficult than you would first think. First, there are hundreds upon hundreds of different stories in the Bible. Although a certain core set may be fairly universal, others must be hand chosen to address specific cultural issues. For example, many people I will meet will have a Roman Catholic background mixed with traditional animistic beliefs. So...stories that illustrate Jesus' power over evil spirits...stories that emphasize salvation by faith and not through sacraments/works...you get the idea. This method ensures that the nationals do not become dependent on the missionary. That is one of the most damaging issues missionaries face. A church planting movement will never explode if it remains under the control of the missionary. It has to move beyond his control and into the hands of the nationals. As Westerners we feel we have to train all the nationals and ensure they have sound doctrine, etc...but that's not quite what the Bible says. It says that we are to show them "how to obey all that the Lord has commanded them." Anything beyond that is the job of the God though the Holy Spirit. But it's so hard for us to take our hands off things isn't it? If we follow Paul's example in the New Testament, he discipled the new believers for a time but then moved on as soon as possible. He would pass back through to encourage them, address sin, or counter false teaching but he stayed out of the picture as much as he conceivably could. Paul also was careful not to baptise the new believers if he could possibly avoid it. He knew that baptizing them himself would cause all kinds of problems in the future. In fact, a dispute erupted in one of his church plants over who had baptized the believers...Paul or Apollos. He wrote how thankful he was that he had only baptized as few of them himself as he did. He knew that baptizing them would cause divisions in the church...believers baptized by missionary often feel they receive a "superior" baptism. It also creates the impression that only the missionary has the authority to baptize. I could go on and on about how bad an idea it is...but I think we would all agree that Paul was one of, if not the greatest, missionary to ever live (not to mention that God thought his model good enough to make it in the Bible). Should we not then follow his example as closely as possible?

So that's a little of the many things I've been learning up here...more updates to come.