Romans Project: Conference Two - Kigali, Rwanda

Today was our second conference in Kigali. It was hosted by the Africa College of Theology, which has a very nice and new facility. They provided us with the largest room in the building and it was packed. The principal, Dr. Gerard Sserywagi, made opening remarks and then introduced us to those present.

Rick taught the first session. He began by orienting the pastor-students on the history of the Romans Project and it's goal to motivate pastors and lay leaders to be life-long students of God's Word. Then he moved into a teaching block of instructing and exhorting preachers to preach directly from the text of Scripture. That seems so obvious, but so many preachers - and not just here in Africa - are not preaching from the very text of Scripture. They may begin a sermon by reading a passage from the Bible, but then they go off and tell amusing anecdotes instead of expounding the truths found in that particular passage.

I had asked for prayer in a previous post for good translators. English is not as widely spoken in Rwanda as it is in other countries we've ministered. God provided us with a young man named Bonheur who is an incredibly gifted translator. He originally was selected to go with us Saturday to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia to translate pastor Scott Gilchrist's teaching through Romans into French. Today he was available to translate for us into Kinyarwanda and will also go with us tomorrow to Gahini for our third conference.

The enthusiasm of those present was exciting. I continue to be amazed at how eager they are to learn these basic principles of observation, interpretation, and application to study God's Word. The interaction of the participants as we worked through these steps was encouraging. They seemed to really be catching on. When we transitioned into the process of organizing their findings from Bible study to Bible exposition, the expressions on their faces showed they were making the connection and discovering the usefulness of these simple steps. Praise God!

Albert Mabasi, the Romans Project coordinator for Rwanda, closed out the conference with a challenge for the participants to complete the reading and writing of Romans in one month. When he asked who desired to take the challenge, all raised their hands. Please pray for all to finish strong.