GOOD NEWS FROM AFRICAN TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP -Spring 2024
In rural Africa committed and passionate pastors serving in poor areas have few or no opportunities for theological training. Therefore, they struggle to effectively lead their churches, communities and their families in a godly way.
Research has found that as many as 90% of church leaders in Africa have not received even a single day of formal training. In our most recent training seminar, which was in March and April 2024 in Longindo, Tanzania, only one pastor had had some sort of training. This was the only pastor out of a group of about 70 pastors in attendance at our training who had an inkling of what Biblical or theological training means.
This is the exact problem that the mission of African Transformational Leadership (ATL) is addressing. Your donations to ATL fund training workshops like the one we just had in Longindo, Tanzania, which was led by our team of passionate, dedicated trainers. Only well-trained African leaders like Peter Esho (Masai Pastor from Kajiado) whom we have trained in the last 3 years can speak with understanding, authority and deep cultural insight into rural contexts like these.
Rural African pastors do not receive pay or salary for their pastoral work but rely on their small farms or livestock for their livelihoods. Your donations to ATL, besides covering funding for all our training, also provide Bibles in the pastors’ native language. We also take clothes to them whenever possible. What has been keeping us motivated to go back to these rural areas again and again is the pastors’ passion to learn, their hunger and thirst that drives them to walk for miles and miles to attend our locally led training conferences.
Our March Training seminar at Longindo, Tanzania was attended by over 70 Pastors. Equipping Masai Pastors and providing them with preaching resources has been an incredibly rewarding project.
We in ATL believe that training effective leaders is part of God’s strategy for evangelizing Africa and building His Church on the continent.
Our program takes the training to where the pastor/leader is and equips him or her to be more effective in what he is already doing, without removing him from his community and church. It is available in most of the broadly spoken languages of Africa. Our educational approach uses seminar-style advanced training in Bible, Practical Ministries, Evangelism and Mission.
ATL trains and disciples indigenous leaders to help carry out the Great Commission. We do this through organizing seminars for pastors, evangelists and church planters. The goal of this training and discipleship is to have mature Christians who can preach and express the gospel in churches, homes, schools and in the marketplace with confidence. Our prayer is that we may glorify God by inspiring and equipping leaders to lead like Jesus.
An excited pastor receiving a certificate and a new Bible in his native language
A pastor holding his old torn Bible missing some books of the Bible and a new Bible and a Certificate
The long-term vision of ATL is to build a Bible College in Kenya in which to conduct our pastor training. To do this, we have acquired a two-acre piece of land in Nakuru County in Kenya and on this property, we have dug a well. Since digging the well in 2022 we have supplied hundreds of homes with clean water. This has transformed the communities in this region. In the past they had to walk for miles to get water from drying streams that made them sick. Women no longer spend hours looking for water. With water available, they can spend that time growing food crops to feed their families, take care of their families and serve the community. The lifestyle of hundreds of families that live here has been transformed. The well has had a great ripple effect in the entire community. Jesus calls us to love one another. We do that when we shift our focus away from fulfilling our own needs and towards meeting the needs of others.
MINISTRY OPPORTUNITIES:
Sponsor pastor training (It takes $350 to train one pastor).
Fund the printing of 1000 Swahili training Manuals -$5 per piece.
Pray for our next mission trip to Kenya- May 25th – June 3, 2024.
Robert & Alice
P.O. BOX 110792,
Nashville, TN 37222
