The Ministry Rationale

The school’s theology of missions.

Our school’s chancellor, John Piper, taught extensively on missions through his preaching and writing. Therefore, it is no surprise that every seminarian, regardless of their concentration, studies the history and theology of missions (3 credits) and is expected to serve in an intentional, supervised teaching ministry in a cross-cultural setting (1 credit).

My Ministry Desire

Since I had to figure out how to fulfill my missions practicum requirement, I wondered what that should look like. The answer was immediately available to me. I wanted to serve in an area that I had tasted some lack. According to statistics, there is one trained church leader for every 230 people in the U.S. and one trained church leader for every 450,000 people worldwide. These numbers, while not exact, highlight the significant need for trained church leaders worldwide. In my case, I spoke English and had some access to resources in English. However, there are many barriers for those who do not speak English. So, I hoped to join a team to teach the Bible to pastors in another language.

My Ministry Partners

It pleased God to open a way for me to partner with Training Leaders International and go to Ambo, Ethiopia, to teach the Ephesians curriculum to local pastors and leaders. The total ministry cost was $4000, of which $3000 was provided by my seminary. Every seminary student is allocated this sum to fulfill their ministry practicum requirement. The seminary sure is serious about missions. The additional $1000 came from friends who generously supported the trip.

The Ministry Prospect

The plan was to travel to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, on Friday, June 7, and return home on Friday, June 14. We would arrive in Addis on Saturday night. From Addis Ababa, we would travel west to Ambo, where each of the teachers would preach on Sunday morning at one of the local church gatherings, teach a class of pastors with the help of interpreters alongside a co-teacher, and lead the site in a devotional each morning. On Thursday, we would return to Addis to fly home.
That sounded like a Navy SEAL operation: get in, get it done, get out. I was slightly nervous about jet lag and its effect on my effectiveness in the classroom. I do need to sleep, and I especially enjoy naps.
I spent time understanding and reviewing Ephesians as best as possible to prepare for the ministry. It helped that I also signed up for an Ephesians exegesis class over the summer.

The Ministry Experience

My team consisted of the team leader and TLI Africa sites coordinator, MR, my missions professor, JH, and a retired veteran missionary, GS. MR was already in Ethiopia, teaching at a different site. He received us at the airport and took us to a hotel where we could rest for a few hours, load up on food, and travel to Ambo to preach that morning. We reached our hotel close to midnight and slept by 1 am. I was up by 5:15 to get ready for a 6 am breakfast. By 7, we headed to Ambo. I think we made it there by 9:30. Along the way, we were stopped at several places by the local police. However, they were friendly. They equated the US with Minnesota. Some asked the pastors to pray for them. We arrived in Ambo, dropped off our luggage in a room in the hotel (consider that a check-in), and took off to various churches with an interpreter. My route happened to be little less than a kilometer by road, about 400 meters on foot on a gravel path, and I was at a tin sheet edifice that was attracting a steady flow of people.
The Ambo Addis Kidan Baptist Church members greeted me just as they greeted one another. It was an interesting handshake. One gently but firmly grasps the right hand of another and then bends forward to make contact right shoulder to right shoulder. In addition to the handshake, women are greeted by contacting cheeks, first the right cheeks and then the left cheeks, while still grasping the right hand. Most of the young people dressed in Western attire. Some of the older women wore traditional Ethiopian attire. Little children were carried on the backs of their mothers with a sash that had me a little concerned as it did not appear as safe as a moby wrap. However, the kids and the mothers did just fine. I joined the congregation as they sang with music and dancing. I had no idea what the words meant, so I simply let the experience settle in without trying to understand.

When it was time to preach I was asked by my interpreter to head up. I preached on Christian forgiveness from Ephesians 4:32–5:2. I have preached this text in two contexts earlier. Once for a church summer picnic gathering (14 minutes long) and once at a suburban church (35 minutes long). This time, I tweaked the message to a 35-minutes-including-interpretation sermon. The language uses more words to express what may be said in a few words in English. So, the interpreter got the larger chunk of time. But praise be to God, from the faces of the congregants, I could tell that they were tracking along. After I was done, it appeared that I was done too soon. They are used to longer sermons and would have gladly enjoyed more time under preaching. Their pastor skillfully led the congregation during a time of prayer as a follow-up to the sermon. Again, their style of prayer is different. The congregation responds with “amen” after every sentence. In the end, when the prayer is offered in the name of Jesus, no one says “amen.” I noticed this pattern over the next four days as well.
After the service ended, I was lovingly attacked by a mob of kindergarten to second-grade children. They all wanted to hold my hands and walk me around their church premises. They kept referring to me as “phorengee” (English: foreigner).
Later, our team reunited for lunch. We had the afternoon to ourselves. To our joy, our team leader told us about a crater lake close to the town. He had never been there, although he had been visiting his site for a few years now. So, we got ready, got into our minivan, and headed off to Lake Wenchi. By the way, in Ethiopia, they call the minivans “dolphins.” Our particular sea mammal was a silver dolphin. Ambo is at an elevation of 2101 meters and is surrounded by hills. Lake Wenchi is at an elevation of 3450 meters. The viewing point is even higher. Our Dolphin seemed to be doing ok during the climb. But as we got higher, it began to heat up and then stopped. We had to wait for it to cool down (the ambient temperature of 16 degrees Celsius and a light drizzle sped up the process). When we reached the viewing point, a thunderstorm joined us. Thankfully, it did not last too long. JH and GS decided to help our local partner’s son, our dolphin driver, and my interpreter for the week to troubleshoot the dolphin. So, a retired American missionary, an American seminary professor, and an Ethiopian lawyer banded together to fix the dolphin. It was determined that the car needed coolant. We had to make a choice: we could take our chance up and down the hills until we made it back to Ambo, or we gave up our water bottles to cool the car. We decided to give up our water bottles. It turned out to be a good choice. Since the rain seemed to stop, we took off to the viewing point and took in this beautiful view. The picture does not do justice to the beauty of the lake. We returned to our hotel and set out for dinner, where we briefly planned for the next four days and prayed.

I was ready for bed. However, I determined I would kill as many of the fifty or so mosquitos in my room before I slept off so that I did not have to worry about the mosquitos. I think I got about twenty or so of them.
The next day, we set off early to get some of that famous Ethiopian coffee—buna—and macchiato. The caffeine helped us overcome the jet lag, by the grace of God. As we arrived at the site, the meeting place was already filled with people singing. At the appointed time, our leader began the course with a devotion. After the devotion, he invited us to come and introduce ourselves. The leader-students were then divided into four classes, each led by a team member. Three of the classes had Oromo-speaking students. I took the fourth class, which had Amharic-speaking students. It was such a joy to work through the lessons on day 1. The students have been growing in the skills imparted to them over five courses by this time. I was only building upon the work of others and their own study of the Scriptures. The students liked my teaching style and vocabulary. My interpreter also said that he found me easy to interpret. I was glad my Indian accent, limited vocabulary, and non-North-American style were received well.
Returning to our hotel that evening, I found no water coming through the faucet in my bathroom. I thought it might be temporary; however, as it turned out, there was no water in the whole region. Later that night, the hotel made arrangements so that each guest received a gallon of water in a bucket for that night. As I headed to bed, team member GS texted us that he was having tummy trouble. I prayed for him and tried to sleep that night.
The next morning, we learned that GS had a terrible night. He did not have the energy to teach that day. We prayed for him and headed off to the site after breakfast. JH led in devotion. My class was combined with GS’s class. I had a new interpreter because I was in a mixed Oromo and Amharic class. The other Oromo classes were already large in size. I taught a lesson and then handed the class over to my co-teacher to teach. During this time, MR and I headed back to the hotel since it was decided that we should move to a different hotel that had sufficient water for its operations. GS seemed to have enough energy to move hotels and seemed optimistic about returning to teach that afternoon. However, climbing up two floors at the new hotel took more from him than he thought it would. It seemed best for him to continue resting. So, that afternoon, I continued to fill in for him. That night, GS joined us for dinner and seemed to be recovering.
On the third day, GS was much better. That morning, he led the devotion, after which we returned to our assigned classes. By noon, I began to feel exhausted. I thought it was the lack of sleep that was getting to me. That evening, after dinner, I had whatever GS had the previous day. I took Tylenol for the fever, asked God to help, and slept that night.
The next morning, I determined not to eat until I was fine. MR gave me some medication, for which I was grateful. As it turns out, JH decided to hang on to some medication himself as he was beginning to sense some trouble. At the site, I led the devotion. I did not have any teaching responsibilities that day. My co-teacher was teaching while I was just observing. Later that morning, the dolphin brought us back to Addis Ababa. Even though we were very early for our flights and the original plan was to eat at a place that served good, safe food, we opined that we preferred access to good restrooms over good food. So, we headed to the airport, checked in, made it through security, and relaxed. The medication and fasting did work. We were able to get some food and begin our journey home. Once we landed in the US, toasted bread and jam tasted delightful!

The Ministry Reflection

The overall feedback I got from the locals was encouraging. My team leader asked me if I would be interested in doing such trips in the future. I thought about it. I would gladly do this again. However, I told him that the prospect of raising money for each trip was not something I could do once I was in India. However, if God allows such ministry trips to be funded, I would gladly go. However, in the future, I will pack some PBnJ just to be sure.