Tim’s Ministry in Colombia & Venezuela

Praise God for a successful ministry trip to Colombia and Venezuela last week! Alejandro Colombo, director of Walk Thru the Bible in South America, and I spent 3 days training 20 pastors and leaders in Bogota, the capital of Colombia. PRAY that they would all teach at least twice in the next 90 days and that they would continue to teach using this life-transforming model.

We then flew to the jungle at the Colombia/Venezuela border and taught in Venezuela. 8 communities of Curipaco Indians (over 400) gathered as they do 3 times a year. There were also Indians from the Cubeo and Puinave tribes. Many of them got saved as a group, as they do in their culture. The problem with that is that some have not personally trusted in Christ as their Savior, but still go through the motions with everyone else. They need to be discipled.

They asked to be taught about purity for the sake of their youth because some girls are getting pregnant out of wedlock. When we got there, we realized that it is not only their youth who needed to hear biblical principles concerning holiness. Alejandro taught “Personal Holiness in Times of Temptation” and we co-taught “Love, Sex and Lasting Relationships.” Some leaders came to us saying that they had never heard teaching like this before and that they really needed it. One lady in her early 30’s approached me after one of my sessions and said, “That man over there is my pastor, and my dad. I have three children with two different dads and I am currently living with another man who is not a Christian. I also am the Sunday School teacher of 28 children.”  Alejandro and I had many counseling opportunities like this throughout the 5 days in the jungle.

I also taught a portion of Walk Thru the New Testament. At the end of session 1, we offer them to make a personal decision to trust in Christ, whether they are religious like Nicodemus (John 3) or immoral like the Samaritan woman (John 4). 10 people raised their hands expressing their new faith in Christ as their Savior! PRAY for the spiritual growth of these new babes in Christ and for those who learned how to be pure and holy.

Successful Sunday School Teacher Training in November

After a  culmination of many months of work and preparation about 100 people attended. It all began because a new family in our church arrived late so I offered to take their child to his SS class in our fledgling church last year.  The teacher didn’t know what she was doing in some areas, so I offered to train her. I spoke with other leaders from other churches and they were also thinking about equipping their teachers. My perspective is, “Why should all of us study and prepare the same thing to teach our teachers? We should gather together and get gifted and experienced children’s teachers to train all of them together!” The SS teachers from our church, El Faro (Lighthouse) chose the date.

  I believe God was honored and attendees were encouraged and learned a lot from the five trainers who are all graduates from the Puebla Bible Seminary.  Elsy, a pastor’s wife, counselor and gifted teacher, taught about the authority God gives us to discipline in class, and how to do it biblically with love and concern for the good of the children. Sara, a CEF trainer explained the different stages of development. Mimí is a godly mom and wife who did a great job in spite of excruciating back pains. She explained the 4 different parts of successfully telling a Bible story. She then went on to pretend we were children in a SS class and told us the Bible story exemplifying the 4 teaching points. Adrián was a definite highlight of the day. He is a creative public speaker, godly husband and father, and creative pastor. Yes, I realize that creative was used twice in that last sentence. He saw a financial need in his congregation a few years ago, so he began a coffee shop and those without jobs worked in it. Daily discipleship was occurring while helping the widows and the needy in their church. This is the man that taught teaching with creativity. Esther was one of my students in the Biblical Panorama class in the seminary a couple of years ago. Her major was Theology and she loves explaining the Scriptures to the women and children in her church.  She focused on the heart of the teacher. We as teachers need to be right with the Lord and filled with the Holy Spirit to minister effectively to the spiritual needs of our students. Praise God with us for these 5 trainers who truly were useful tools in His hands last Saturday. Also please pray the 100 attendees would take the truths of the Scriptures to heart and live them out as they impact the next generation for eternity.

I had also asked different ministries to provide materials to sell; ELA is our mission’s publishing house had hundreds of books on their table, Obrero Fiel is also another ministry of our mission (check it out on obrerofiel.com) they had a table full of studies and materials that meet the needs of ministers, APEN (Child Evangelism Fellowship in Spanish) had puppets and training materials for Sunday School and kids clubs on their table. I had Walk Thru the Bible materials, cds with music by Abisai, one of my dad’s students (and now fellow teacher) at the Rio Grande Bible Institute, and cds of Bible songs that I wrote and recorded.

Many expressed that they hoped that this would not be the last training.  please pray that this will be able to continue here in Puebla.