DR Day 3: Conference and Downline Class

Today we started off with some prayer time at the house and then headed to the church to start day 1 of our conference with the local Haitians.  The pastor of the church there (also named Roosevelt) challenged his members to come and to bring someone with them.  When we first arrived, there were just a few people there to attend, but we soon remembered we are on "island time" and we had lots of people come in after a short time (even though we would have been happy with just one person attending, it was great to see lots of faces).  We had some singing and also the teachings.

Roosevelt (translator) opens us up with prayer.

Steve taught first on the Great Commission.  He broke it down into very simple explanations of Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How....even including some hand motions to help the people remember.

Here we all are doing the hand motions:  Who is to make disciples?  ME!

The students and our team listen intently.

Later Steve gave an illustration about how to "pour into" a disciple.  He used a bucket and asked what would be the most effective way to pour water into the smaller water bottles.  He started out by asking if it would work well to just throw the water?  The group caught on quickly that the best way to pour into a disciple is to get up close and really concentrate and develop a relationship with the disciple.

Walt also teaches on Jesus' plan for vision and strategy to reach the whole world and tell them the gospel.

 We had a board to use to help get the points across.

Pastor Roosevelt gave a heartfelt speech at the end of the talks about how excited and grateful he is that Downline will be being taught in the church next year.  He really seems to understand the gospel.  The whole ministry has been greatly blessed by meeting him.

One of the local church members came to the conference.  She slept off and on during the teachings due to some pain that she's had chronically in her neck, head, and back.  The team prayed over her for healing and relief.

This is the outside of the church we are utilizing for the conference.  This is also where Downline will be held next year.

This is one of the Downline women students.  Before class and any time there is a break, she is working on her crochet projects.  This is how she makes money.  She's made a few beautiful things for some of our team members.  Don't worry, she pays attention during class time.  She is a great note taker!

Bill and Roosevelt introduce the start of this week's Downline class.  We will be having class Monday through Friday and the graduation for this year's students will be held on Friday.

Steve teaches the Downline students from 2 Timothy 2.

DR Day 2: Church and Villagers

Hello again!  Today we went to church at a local Haitian church.  This is the church that is hosting our conferences this week and this is most likely where the DR Downline will be meeting next year.

We also got a chance to go and visit Roosevelt's (our translator) home, as well as some of the villagers and this year's Downline students homes.  The children were so happy to see us and led us through the village as we went along.

We went to visit a Dominican church tonight.  The atmosphere is quite a bit different from the Haitian church we visited this morning.  Lots of singing and praise!

 The children were amazing and loved all over us....and we loved back!

 The church service this morning was great!  It was very different than a service in the states.  The people are so passionate as they sing.  Bill got up and spoke briefly about what we will be doing this week at the conference. Then Steve preached a message about Jesus making fishers of men.  Finally, the local pastor spoke about 2 Samuel.

 Roosevelt's sister-in-law lives with he and his wife.  She makes these baskets out of wrappers and she's working on one here.

 Roosevelt's wife (Nelly) and his 2 children in the kitchen.

 This is the outside of Roosevelt's home.

Another shot of the local children laughing and high-fiving with Mamie.  The home in the middle was so colorful I just had to include it.  On the bottom right, Bill visits with one of this year's Downline students.  We will be seeing her this week at class.

DR Day 1: We Arrived!

Hello everyone!  Just wanted to let you all know that we made it to the island without any troubles.  We were met at the airport by our host family, Bill and Debbie, and they took us to our home for the week.  We got settled in and heard a bit about our plans for the week and Debbie cooked us a fabulous dinner.  We will be going to church in the morning at the new building that will be hosting the DR Downline next year.  

Sri Lanka Update #4

Fish Robinson

Bart Leidecker

Wes Selecman 

These are just a few pictures of the team in action. We had a great three day conference with the people at Calvary Church. There were many people eager to learn and implement Jesus strategy of making disciples! Looking forward to seeing the fruit God brings!

Sri Lanka Update #3

Today (Thursday) we had lunch at a Seafood Restaurant. As we ate we saw a group of 8-10 young Muslim men walking on the beach. We were excited for an opportunity to go talk with the group. These young men were around 20 years old and had traveled from 100 kilometers away to come to Colombo for training. We had an awesome opportunity to dialogue with them about Jesus. JB attended training on the most effective way to share the gospel with Muslims the weekend before this trip and was able to apply much of that training in our conversation with these young men. Please pray that some of the gospel seeds will take root and grow! It has been very common to meet followers of all the major world religions here – Buddhist, Muslim, and Hindu.

In the evening our conference began at Calvary Church (www.calvarychurchsrilanka.com). This is a church in the heart of Colombo, which is the capitol city of Sri Lanka. Calvary has seven services in three different languages and numerous satellite locations throughout the region. As we taught there was simultaneous translation into two languages – Singlese and Tamil. There were people in the room wearing headphones hearing the teaching in their native tongue.

 All week long they have told us they were expecting around 100 people, but we ended up having 250 people sign up and come! We are very thankful for a large pool of people and pray that God will impact individuals to engage in disciple making, to live a disciple making lifestyle. Tonight Steve taught the Great Commission and JB taught on the Vocabulary of Discipleship. It appeared that everyone was taking notes and listening eagerly! The response to the teaching was incredibly positive and we pray God will bring fruit!

Please pray for us as the conference has two more days! Matthew 28:18-20 - Ta Ethnae!

Sri Lanka Update #2

On Tuesday at 6 am we drove nearly 9 hours into tea country (Sri Lanka is famous for tea) to meet with Pastor Rodrigo. Pastor Rodrigo is an amazing man of God who lives surrounded by Buddhists, Muslims, and Hindus (all three have buildings with 100 yards of each other).

Because of the ministry he is doing he has had several threats and attempts on his life and even been stoned. We taught two sessions with his church. In a first for both JB and Steve, we were translated into two languages. JB would speak, then the pastor would translate, and then the associate pastor would translate him.

We were able to spend two meals talking disciple-making with Pastor Rodrigo and left him with several resources. Wednesday we drove back to Colombo, a journey that took over 12 hours due to having to fix the brakes. Today (Thursday in Sri Lanka) we start the main conference at Calvary Church. Thanks for your prayers!

Sri Lanka Team Arrives

Four us (L-R: Bart Leidecker, Steve Winstead, JB Selecman, and Fish Robinson) left from Memphis on Saturday, May 5 heading for Colombo, Sri Lanka. We met up with our fifth team member, Wes Selecman, at layover in Chicago. Along the way, we had several gospel conversations with folks on our flights. We have layover in Abu Dhabi, UAE and then landed in Colombo at 3:30 am on Monday, May 7. Our host Heshan was excited to great us at the airport. We realized at the airport that this is a very important holiday for Buddhist. This is the celebration of when it is believed that Buda was born, received his enlightenment, and died. All this is believed to have happened on the same day. Over 70% of people in Sri Lanka are Buddhist. Less than 10% of the population is Christian. 42 of the 50 people groups in Sri Lanka are considered unreached. Pray that Christians will be given an opportunity to point others to Christ during this time. We just arrived at our hotel. Tomorrow we will go to the Tea Country and teach at a rural church. We will start our three-day conference with the folks at Calvary Church on Thursday. Pray that our team will be able to communicate clearly gospel-centered discipleship.