Training Leaders

A dirt road winds through the interior mountains of our island. On both sides, bamboo houses with thatched roofs occupy small plots of level ground among the foothills. Families and farmers plow the land, plant and harvest, then market their crops in the town below. This year, the steady rains have left the mountains green and lush.

Five house churches, spaced about a mile apart along the road, represent the presence of God’s kingdom in this remote area. A sixth house church meets regularly for worship about a mile north of the road. Danny oversees the house churches and trains their leaders.

“I meet with them each week,” Danny explains. “I listen to their testimonies of how God is at work in their group, then we talk about any challenges they have. I pray with them. I encourage them to continue building God’s kingdom and sometimes we set goals of how many people they should witness to each week.”

As Martha and I visited the churches’ leaders, we were blessed by their humility and perseverance. “Some people don’t understand how we can worship in our house and study the Bible on our own, but we do.” Another leader explained that the day before, they had baptized 2 new believers in a nearby river.

Several of the church members testified how God had blessed them since they gave their lives to Jesus. When I asked a church member what changes she had seen in her life, she explained that she no longer gets angry at her sister. “The Lord has shown me how I can control my words.”

During their worship, all of the house church leaders use our ‘Simbalay’ guide that has questions for 100 Bible stories. They sing hymns in the local language. Everyone participates. One of the church leaders has started a new house church among relatives in a nearby town.

While we are still a long way from seeing a CPM (Church Planting Movement), we are seeing what can happen when one leader faithfully trains others to lead. Please continue to partner with us in prayer that we can learn to train leaders who, in turn, know how to train other believers to grow God’s kingdom.