September 2021 Update
Our hands are over our mouths.. It’s really happening!!
When Dieudonne first arrived back in Cameroon a few years ago, he followed God’s leading to purchase a piece of property to be a home for the yet-to-be planted church and school. Originally this was a mountain of dirt. Ask us sometime to tell the story of how God removed the mountain. We are planning to put up a three story building here that will house the church plant, the school and a printing ministry. We still don’t know when that will happen, but our hands are over our mouths as we watched God provide the money to build a wall around the property—all ahead of our schedule! So when He says, “Build the building” we will be ready. God amazingly provided all the funds for this wall without any fund-raising campaign. But when he says, now is the time to share the vision for the building, we will do so with joy and have a campaign to give the blessing of partnering in this work to as many as possible who sense God’s joyful leading to take up the challenge with us. The people of Èglise Baptiste Bethléem are already giving substantially to help make this happen.
Today I will be flying back to Minneapolis after a few weeks here in Cameroon. What joy to be face to face, personally in the classroom with these men I love so much. Zoom is good, being physically present in the classroom is better.. I marvel at the progress they are making in their studies and the passion to serve the advance of Christ’s kingdom, however he leads them. One of the students brought me into town yesterday to help me get my required Covid test for my trip back home and also to pick up some small gifts for my grand-kids. It was inspiring to hear him tell me his life’s story and his call to ministry as we sat out a rainstorm under the umbrella of a table in a back alley cafe.
Teaching at the MDiv level is so strategic yet so rare. We hope to impact many lives at this level. But we are also eager to train pastors who don’t have the educational background or the time to commit to full-time study. So many of these pastors lack solid training and they are hungry to learn the whole Bible at a deeper level. This is where Training Leaders International comes in. Another leader from TLI flew to Yaoundé to meet me so that we could get together with a denominational leader who thinks TLI’s approach is tailor-made for what many of his pastors need. His denomination has 100 churches in Yaoundé and many others scattered throughout the French speaking side of Cameroon. The meetings went very well. Now TLI will discuss and pray about this opportunity and decide in the next several weeks if Yaounde should become a TLI site. Please join us in prayer about this. Dieudonne and I are hoping that some of our MDiv students can assist TLI in teaching their three-year sequence of 9 courses.
So much trouble all over the world and Cameroon is no exception. One of our students told me a couple days ago that a bomb went off in his village killing 20 people. God have mercy. Please pray for peace.
Your partnership continues to help all this happen. My next trip back, Lord willing is in mid-November and then another trip is planned with Julie and with Kenny and Kathy Stokes in late January. I couldn’t do this without your prayers and financial support. Your questions and ideas are always welcome!
With gratitude and joy,
Pastor Tom