Training Pastors Worldwide

Vickie and I just completed our 4000 mile trip to encourage missionaries in Utah, attend TLI’s conference in Colorado, and visit family, friends and supporters west of the Rockies. Our trip was absolutely fantastic. We came home encouraged by the fellowship, teaching, and beautiful sites of Utah, Colorado, Wyoming, Idaho, Montana, and Washington. We also drove through parts of Nevada.

Vickie and I arrived back home in California, but then I left four days later for South Africa. Currently it is winter there. Our mission: to train pastors and church leaders at two sites: Kimberley and Queenstown.

In Kimberley we had time for a three hour safari. The temperature was very cold! That’s me layered and bundled up to ward off the wind and cold. It seemed like at every turn, our open-bed touring truck got colder and colder. Fortunately our host gave us blankets, or I would not be writing this letter from Orange but from heaven itself.

Our first training was in the city of Kimberly. There were 20 eager students in a classroom without heat. I was warm while teaching, but the rest of our crew was chilly. We taught skills for interpreting the Gospels using Mark as an example. Great students and a great week.

My favorite memory was when the students were working in groups of three, answering questions from their Bibles, working on honing their understanding based on authorial intent.

Our TLI group spent a couple of nights in Fish Hoek, near Cape Town, before our next scheduled training in Queenstown. Fish Hook is a beautiful, quaint, city south of Cape Town.

Following our days in Fish Hoek we traveled to Queenstown. Our two teaching partners taught a couple of lessons each from the curriculum. One of the teachers alternated between English and the local language dialect as he taught. He was very effective in reaching the students. As always, our goal is to train local leaders to train local leaders.

South Africa is a study in economic disparity. These squatters camps pictured are built using tin roofing. However, as soon as the electricity is provided, via the government, the television satellite dishes go up. The entertainment industry reigns in America and South Africa.

TLI sent its own camera crew with us on this trip: pictures, interviews, and video clips for advancing the mission of TLI. These two ladies look very professional as they record testimonies from students and trainers.

After returning to the United States, I recently attended a TLI Diaspora training in Redlands, CA, here is the link to our Diaspora division. Our Diaspora partner has assembled a very fine group of trainers, using a Spanish version of our curriculum, to equip church leaders and strengthen the church in Southern California.

Thank You: for your prayers, and for you giving, and interest in the ministry of training church leaders.

Bob and Vickie Burris

Pure joy! Cousin bath time at grandpa and grandma’s house.

In just a few days I will begin a busy season of traveling and training. Here’s my/our itinerary. Vickie will be with me in the U.S., but so far, she has not traveled with me to Africa. In the future, South Africa might be a possibility for a trip together.

June 8 – 29: Training Leaders International Annual retreat at Glen Eyrie Navigator’s retreat center in Colorado Springs, CO. We have not had a retreat since 2019, COVID induced. This will be an exciting time, especially for Vickie to meet the guys I work with and their wives. After our 4 days at Glen Eyrie, we will drive to Wyoming, Utah, Idaho, and Nevada, to visit supporters and family. I will be home for a few days and then fly to South Africa.

This picture is Glen Eyrie in the winter!

July 4 – 16: Queenstown and Kimberley, South Africa. This will be my first time in South Africa. Our team will be training two groups: In Kimberley we will teach Course 1: Knowing God, Scripture and Ourselves. In Queenstown our agendas will be Course 4: Interpreting the Gospels: Mark. New for for me – it will be winter in South Africa, and the weather will be a little chilly. I will be packing accordingly. My first cold weather trip with TLI!

I’ve never seen this parking warning before, but I will be checking when we are on the coast.

August 24 – September 9: Sierra Leone, Makeni and Freetown. One week in Makeni teaching Course 4, Interpreting the Gospels: Mark. One week in Freetown teaching my favorite course, Course 2: Knowing the Story of the Bible. If anyone is interested in seeing the curriculum, send me an email.

October 9 – 12: Fall staff meeting in Minneapolis.

October 27 – November 11: Sierra Leone, Makeni and Freetown. I will teach course 5 in Makeni: Poetry. In Freetown we will be focusing on Old Testament Narrative and Law. The change from December to November for Sierra Leone training means that this will be the first time in 5 years that I haven’t been in Africa during December.

Shameless grandsons pic.

And finally, the heart of why I go to Africa, a quote from D.A. Carson,

“Should the Lord in His mercy ever pour out large-scale revival on any part of the world where I have influence, I shall devote all my energy to teaching the Word, to training a new generation of godly pastors, to channeling all of this God-given fervor toward doctrinal maturity, multiplication of Christian leaders, evangelistic zeal, maturity in Christ, genuine Christian ‘fellowship.'”

Thank you for praying, giving, sending, and reading.

Bob

Here’s a last minute addition. Article in Christianity Today about worldwide theological education.

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2023/may-web-only/theological-education-global-church-growth-icete.html

Hello friends! Here’s the latest from Africa. The most recent trip was a difficult and yet a good and rewarding adventure. During the first week I was in Minneapolis at staff meetings and then we left for Makeni, Sierra Leone.

We had a very productive 3 weeks of training pastors and church leaders. Here’s a recap and news about future trips.

After our first week (see last blog post) we hiked up the hill behind the Bridge of Hope compound in Makeni on Saturday morning. It was a 1/2 hour climb. Every year the hill is burned the hill to keep the vegetation down. The plants look dead but out of the darkened branchlets come new growth. There is a sermon illustration in there somewhere.

This hike was one of the very rare outings we have taken when we travel to Africa. We had some wonderful hosts at the compound in Makeni but just a little free time and so we enjoyed the morning’s hike together with our guide, Joseph. On the way home back to the center, we met the man who owns the land. His son attends the Bridge of Hope school. The owner was very happy to meet us.

This photo below shows the kitchen that serves lunch to several hundred students every day.

Here is the group from Makeni. We have grown to love these student. Our partner provided all the students with very cool TLI shirts!

Our first official class in Freetown began the Monday morning of our second week in Sierra Leone. We had 45 students and three teachers including me.

We met in the newly constructed block wall classrooms, complete with white boards and fans.

The students came well prepared and were on time. We are looking forward to another great week of training in early September.

During the third week the Sierra Leone American teaching team returned to the U.S., but I took a short flight to Liberia to join 4 other U.S. trainers for another week of instruction.

Three of us team-taught with three Liberian men who have been faithful to their studies and have grown in their faith tremendously over the last 2 years. The ministry in Liberia has been greatly assisted by TLI’s full time, in country, trainer, Ryan Currie. Ryan and his family have been residents of Liberia for the last 15 months and trained, discipled, and loved these men and developed them so that they could ably co-lead our classes.

Unfortunately, this will be TLI’s last trip to Liberia until administrative changes are made with the Monrovia site. The leader, Dyonah Thomas, has breached our trust, in many ways, including finances, and until there is a changes in leadership we departed, for the last time. With sadness we left, but we are trusting God that our labors will bear fruit and that in the future we will be able to return.

For me, this departure means that my two primary training centers will be in Sierra Leone – Makeni and Freetown. I will have some free weeks during the year to travel to other TLI sites and teach.

The picture below is of our final team meal together at the airport restaurant. Tim, on the left next to me, brought his daughter on the trip. She added a little 16 year old perspective and humor that we haven’t experienced before. Fun!

Team teaching requires listening to one another and giving helpful instruction. Tim, seated foreground, is one our our best volunteer teachers ( shout-out to William Tennent School of Theology, WilliamTennent.org ), and he was able to coach and encourage Roland, one of our star trainees.

As always, the students have open Bibles and student handbooks, during the discussions.

Additionally, some of you contributed reading glasses for the students who were having trouble. Here’s a common site in our classrooms – cell phone flashlights for clearer text. All 20 or so pairs of glasses were scooped up, and very much needed and appreciated by the students. THANKS!

I came home happy, encouraged by the progress in Makeni, excited about the new students in Freetown, pleased with the progress over the last two years in the church leaders in Liberia, and sad that our time there is over for now. Please pray with me for all three sites and that the difficulties in Liberia can be overcome.

Thanks,

Bob