Day 6, Saturday, September 11th: A letter from Tim Roehl President of Fit and Flourish about his time with 4G3 in Egypt
We are back at the Guest House in Cairo...all of us weary but happy for the amazing days the Lord gave us together. Coming back, we experienced "3 lanes of road with six lanes of traffic"...the congestion of late afternoon Cairo traffic. "All part of the experience," I reminded the team with a smile.
Our Sudanese brothers and sisters led a powerful time of worship as we began our day. We sense the glory of God in our midst! Yesterday I danced with the men in front of the group. Today Shirley joined the women! Such joy filled the place!
The passion for Jesus these men and women have is convicting and humbling for us who come from America. Where many American "Christians" have a mental assent to God, living out their faith is optional. As we heard the stories of people and what they face here in this part of the world, we repeatedly heard, "Jesus is life! Jesus is all we have...and Jesus is enough."
We finished our training by putting everyone in pairs and coaching each other through the whole coaching pathway. Since we couldn't understand what they were saying, we walked around and smiled to encourage them. It is very powerful to see people coaching each other...the coach listening intently, occasionally asking questions while the person being coached was sharing their hearts openly.
Lindsay Grass also presented a bit today, so everyone on our team of six helped lead the training. That's exciting for me...and also shows the power of interactive scripted training!
At the end of the training, Shirley Roehl invited people to testify to what they learned. People from this part of the world are already warm and gracious, but their gratitude for what they learned was unusually moving for me. Jake Grass led the group to share about the benefits of coaching for their everyday lives and ministry and how they would use coaching skills.
I finished with a brief word of encouragement and then prayed a blessing and commissioning for them as coaches. They will use the word "Barnabas" to describe their ministry of coaching.
The 4G3 Team gave each member of our Fit & Flourish Team a unique and beautiful gift. The ladies got a silver necklace with their name in English on one side and in Arabic on the other. The men received a key chain also in silver with our name in English on one side and Arabic on the other. Wow!
I got to hand out a certificate for everyone who completed the training and get a picture with them. That was fun. George, the Director of Training, interviewed us on video and asked us different questions about our experience here.
We are very impressed with the 4G3 Team...and they expressed the same to us. Our team, having never been to Africa before and also had never done this training before, was awesome. They jumped right in to sit with people, make friends and be available to serve in any way needed. Shirley Roehl and I are very proud of Jake and Lindsay Grass and Tim AshlynEntgelmeier!
We were mindful that today is the 20th anniversary of 9/11. We saw our only hope of a world being healed and untied...through the love of Jesus. May it be so, Lord.
Tomorrow we get Covid tested to see if we can fly home late, late Monday night. We'll get to see some sights in this historically rich part of the world.
Thanks for praying...we saw God move deeply and mightily in people's hearts and minds at the Conference. But...this is just the beginning!
There's plenty more we could share, but that's all for tonight.
Please keep praying for health.
