let's be social!
As soon as we returned back to Houston from the vision trip, we jumped right into missionary training. If you remember, this training program was the reason we moved down to Houston to begin with (though over the months God has revealed to us that it certainly wasn’t His whole reason, as there has been so much more), as we have to complete training prior to moving to the field.
We really had no idea what to expect from training, but it has been incredible! It’s like sitting in a seminary classroom, only without the 200-page thesis due at the end! I LOVE that we get to go to class each day, talk about South Sudan and missions, take notes, and have discussions…and this is our JOB!!!
So, training is designed to give us the classroom hours and content material we need in order to be prepared for the field (as prepared as possible), but also give us time for fundraising and other personal preparation (such as discipleship, evangelism, and prayer). During the classroom hours, we cover many topics such as:
- The history of South Sudan
- Contextualization of the Gospel
- The history of the Church in South Sudan
- Chronological Bible Storying
- Cross-cultural friendships
- Big, Long-term Picture
- Spiritual Warfare
- Spiritual Dynamics
- Exercise on the foreign mission field
- Media on the foreign mission field
- Linguistics and Language Learning
- Development
- Church planting
If it seems like a lot, that’s because it is! In addition to the classroom hours, we also have field work assignments (which I’ll write about soon) and weekly theological formation assignments. We have been training in the afternoons four days each week, but next week we will begin our full-time training.
I can’t stress enough how thankful I am for this training. Because I didn’t go to seminary, I have struggled with feeling so incompetent for becoming a missionary. What I am learning in training is exceptionally valuable, as there is a lot to learn from missionaries who have gone before us. At the same time, I am also learning just how much of what happens in Nasir is really in God’s hands. We could train for years, but in the end, it’s going to take a move of the Holy Spirit for any real transformation to occur. Our jobs are to just show up and be willing to walk wherever He leads us each day.
