Here is an excerpt from a prayer letter you will probably be receiving in the mail. Please pray for the leadership development projects in Latin America, for me as I write up a proposal for training in Latin America, for David Strumbeck as he is presently helping our leadership training efforts in Chile (for a month), and for more people who would be willing to join us in this endeavor.

Thanks,

Gary

Church Planting Movements and Leadership Training

One of the primary tasks of the Resource Team for Latin America has been to think through the best ways to promote church planting movements. We are convinced that the integration of church planting, training and personal growth is one of the keys. I call this "covenantal training." It assumes that one cannot really understand God's Word without putting it into practice in a given context, that this obedience is not really possible without love, and that true love requires understanding of God's Word. So the more you obey and love, the more you understand.

In other words, we should train people in the context of church planting and plant churches through people we are training. The church planting effort becomes the training ground for future leaders and the church planter doubles as a trainer. In this way we are able not only to transmit the necessary content, but we are also able to model it and give the trainees the opportunity to understand the relevance of their studies to the planting of a church in a given culture and to their own personal growth.