Load up the truck with 10 guys and head to the bush for 3 days of bible teaching and Jesus and passion films. In America we would call that a men’s retreat. Here it’s part of stratigic plan to bring the good news in a clear and understandable and reproducible way to all the villages. In a few weekends we will load up and head south, gather some more guys on our way to another group of villages. We stop at the last village and camp for the weekend. It took about 3 hrs of bush driving to gather everyone today but 5 villages are represented. We all sleep under the stars on the ground by the campfire (it gets cold at night) and listen to the elephants and other wild game talk to us at night.
These guys receive a solar audio player which they take back to their village. They also take a hard copy of the lessons in their native language which we translated. On the players are scriptures we have translated in the native language. We also include the stories we have created. Recently we have been able to record a few spiritual songs in their tradition and include those. Think of these players as a Bible. Although incomplete, I always rely on the Spirit to touch their hearts and speak to them. These players “God’s words” will outlast any missionary which is encouraging when we are in the story creation, translation trenches working hard to make it understandable. On top of that four of my disciples did the bulk of the teaching this weekend. I only taught 2 out of 10 lessons and they setup the films. Now if I can just teach one of them how to drive they could do it their self.
After we watched the Jesus film. One guy asked why did they want to kill Jesus, he was such a nice guy? Great question. My response was to say we need to answer two questions. Why did they do it, and why did Jesus let them? After the passion film a couple guys said, we now believe Jesus was real and do what people before you said. Thank you for your support and prayers as God continues to touch hearts and we get to see those rewards.
Jeremy
Ha3els in Africa 