The past two weeks and this next week before leaving for India and then Africa, I have been spending all day from morning till late at night in the Word of God in preparation for 20 different messages and lessons and sermons I will be giving in those locations. It has been an amazing time, and I feel like my mind is saturated with God’s Word, His thoughts are flowing through my veins, His will is filling my heart – it is truly an encouraging time (see Psalm 119).

The trainings we do overseas to groups of pastors always are centered on the Bible. We are training pastors who have no formal training how to study, obey and teach God’s Word well (Ezra 7:10), which is the starting point for growing a healthy church. In India we will be doing two workshops for pastors, and then in Uganda and Tanzania another three workshops, each centered on another part of Scripture. So I’m pouring through the various texts so that I understand them well myself, and can then give this training to others. As we work through books of the Bible, we teach various tools in how to see what the writer was saying to the original readers (who lived many years ago in a different culture and background), and then to understand the writer’s main point for what he’s trying to communicate, and then finally to bring the message to today with timeless application principles.

The pastors we work with soak this material up, and it is a blessing to prepare the messages and then to give them to hungry souls. After each training, all the participants are expected to pass the training on to other pastors in their various regions (2 Tim.2:2), thus the message multiplies and hundreds and thousands of pastors are receiving tools in how to handle God’s Word well (2 Tim.2:15).

In addition to the blessing of being in the Word and learning more of God and His ways and will, this time is also filling me up spiritually for the challenges that lay ahead. The places we go to are spiritually very dark, and I will be giving a great deal to the participants in many ways, so to be fully charged up with the Spirit will be essential for a God-honoring, Spirit-empowered, Christ-centered time. We most certainly appreciate any prayers you offer up on our behalf. The time away will be from Oct.23 – Nov.18.

Walking in step with the Spirit, by the grace of God. Eric