Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,
This last month has been one full of the Lord’s blessings…
Preaching Workshop
July started with a preaching workshop organized by the Charles Simeon Trust. It was wonderful to have around 60 preachers from all over the country join us to study how to preach from Old Testament narrative. The workshop leaders, Jeremy Meeks and Chris Spano were very helpful and inspiring as they helped us to get to grips with 1 Samuel and see how to preach Christ from the text and bring out the main teaching from the passage in line with the book as a whole and God’s redemption plan. I was personally helped and challenged by the two days of teaching and am sure all those present will find their preaching will benefit as a result. We are looking forward to this workshop becoming an annual part of our academic year.
Teaching in Lima and Jauja
David Silva was in the mountains in Jauja for a week teaching 13 church leaders on the subject of biblical theology, helping the students to see how the Bible fits together as history goes through the stages of creation, fall, redemption and consummation.
Meanwhile, Evair Córdova has been teaching on the doctrines of man and sin in our center in Comas in the north of Lima. This is a key course which lays the foundation for a correct understanding of other subjects such as the doctrine of salvation and evangelism. It is also very helpful to lay a solid foundation for biblical counselling.
Possible New Centre in Lima
A couple of weeks ago the leadership team from the CTB (Baptist Theological Centers) met with a pastor from a large church who is very keen that we help train the leadership in his church and those in other churches in the area. The church premises would be ideal for another center and we are excited about the possibility of opening a third training center in Lima next year. Please pray that the Lord would guide us clearly as we seek wisdom concerning this decision.
PhD Studies
This month I also spent two weeks studying in Guatemala. This semester I shall be taking two new courses: The first is on curriculum, and we shall be considering all of the different elements to take into account when developing or changing the curriculum for a Bible seminary. The other course is on the subject of theological method. We shall be seeing seeing how such things as tradition, logic, experience and culture affect our theology even when we are unaware of it. During my time in Guatemala I also had a 3-day seminar on practical theology with emphasis on biblical counseling.
Preparing for Hebrew Classes
Over the course of this month I have also been preparing to teach a new introductory course on Hebrew to 2 groups of students. The classes will start next week and we are thankful for the large amount of interest which there is for the course. We are praying that the course will help students to be able to work with the biblical text more accurately in order to make them better teachers and preachers of God’s Word.
Thank you for your partnership in our ministry.