Gospel Paintings & Communication - January 2 & 4 Training

On Saturday, January 2, the students on the Senegal team had an early start to the year with a day long training session. We met at 9:30am at Markham Baptist Church. Jocelyn led us in a time of teaching about prayer and then in a time of prayer itself. I have found that the students are shy about praying out loud. However, Jocelyn was very clear in her encouragement to be courageous to pray. Perhaps, you can pray that the Spirit of God would do a work of revival in our team and that one of the fruits of this revival would be a passionate yearning to be with God in prayer. I long for that day when the love and fear of God would be more persuasive than the love and fear of our neighbor's opinion of us. Such a moment will come and it will come by God's grace. Please pray this into being for our team.

After spending some time in prayer, we moved to the church's gymnasium where we spent the remainder of the day. Paul McDonald, a street evangelist from the west end of the city, gave a very powerful exhortation around the preaching of the gospel. (Paul has a blog about his evangelistic ministry at http://goodnewsfortoronto.wordpress.com)

Paul explained what the gospel is (and isn't) and the joy and necessity of preaching the gospel. He then taught the students a very effective means of communicating the gospel by painting out stories on a sketchboard. The students were taught a lesson on Peter's walking on water, how Peter began to drown and cried out, "Lord save me!" Likewise, we are facing sure death and hell because of our sin. However, if we, like Peter, look to Jesus and ask him to save us, he will - because he has paid the penalty for our sin on the cross and has risen to life again.

I am very glad that Paul was there with the students, to glory in the gospel and provide very meaningful training in how to communicate it. I've attached a photo of Paul training the students in sketchboard evangelism with this email.

The remainder of the day was spent fastidiously learning the techniques behind preparing and presenting effective "gospel sketches." It was trying at times, to maintain the aesthetic quality of the painting while preaching. All the student had an opportunity to practice with each other. Hopefully, you will be able to view one of these presentations before our departure.

While the students were training on the sketchboard, Daisy and a couple of students were baking cookies for a Parent-Information session which concluded the evening. As always the parents were more concerned than the students were. However, they were genuinely grateful for the opportunities that their children will have to proclaim the gospel.

On Monday evening, Diane, came in to the weekly training session and exhorted the students around the area of communication, the importance of taking initiative and the avoidance of cliques, to name a few of the items she addressed.

As we approach the day of departure (February 26), there is still much work to be done:

We continue to raise financial support for the trip. To this end, Lord willing, Miss Kang's business class and the Senior team will be hosting a fundraising dessert night on Monday, February 15. It is a holiday (Family Day) - if you and your family are able to attend, we would encourage you to do so to support the team.

We have two more all day training sessions on January 23 and February 22. On January 23, the Radfords' eldest daughter will be leading the training and providing more background for our students on her parents' ministry and life in Senegal.

Needless to say, this is demanding work and we need you to continue to pray for us and the team. Pray that God would revive our spirits and give us a joy in Him that would pour forth in our ministry. Pray that we would have the same desire as the Apostle Paul, namely to know nothing except Christ crucified.