The “city of brotherly love” (i.e. Philadelphia) is alive and well. This past week I crossed the US and met with a diverse group of ministry leaders and pastors to offer our third and final in our series of stateside workshops. In this workshop we primarily focus on the “Whole Story of the Bible,” but also spend some time touching on all the remaining workshops and some important procedural items for those traveling with us globally.
The network itself was a joyfully diverse blend of people who are from or have spent extensive time in Pakistan, Columbia, Haiti, Cameroon, India, and many other locations. Their significant cross-cultural experience made for some sweet story times and application of Pathways principles to global audiences. We were also blessed to have Laura Carter, our Pathways for Women leader, join us from Iowa.
The third stateside workshop is a bit different than most other workshops (stateside and globally) because we have a short amount of time to expose the pastors to a great deal of material, so there is not as much time to practice principles with exercises and interaction. However, we certainly engaged much with each other throughout the days, learning and growing together from God’s Word.
Another sweet element of this past week was staying in the home of Theodor and Love Yonkeu. Both Theodor and Love are Cameroonian natives, with a thick French accent and a heart to reach their people. They have been serving in ministries in the States for 14 years, but continue to stay connected with needs in Cameroon. This is the primary reason I went to Philadelphia, because others who are closer could have led the workshop. But I wanted to spend time with Theodor and Love, to get to know them and strategize with my colleague Randy how to launch a Pathways network in Yaounde, Cameroon. I am happy to report that we have a good plan in place to bring Pathways to a network representing at least three significant denominations in this region.
For the “sprinkles on top” of a great trip, hosting pastor Mike and his wife Cindy fed us amazing food for breakfast and lunch each day, and I was able to explore some of the areas surrounding the church taking runs after training finished. Weather was a sizzling 97 degrees during the day, so I was thankful I enjoy heat!
However, both Randy and I had some struggles with Delta delays in getting home in a timely manner. In fact, Randy and Pastor Kurt are on their way right now trying to get to Monrovia, Liberia to lead workshop 2 for the network there, but are encountering significant challenges that threaten to make the workshop impossible to conduct. Please pray for no further delays. At the same time, Air France cancelled my flight to Bamako, Mali for next week, so I also was scrambling to find alternative ways to train the networks in Mali and Central African Republic Sept. 15-30. Please continue to pray the enemy will not prevail and we will be able to do the training to which God has called us. Grace and peace in His strength. Eric
