Navigators at Their Best

I just got off the phone with Ralph and Tim, two Navigator missionaries from the UK who will be going into an Eritrean refugee camp in Ethiopia this weekend.  I told them that what they are doing is a model of Navigators at their best. 

Ralph has been discipling a young man that I will call Abe.  He encouraged Abe to share what he is learning with others.  Now Abe has 600 Eritrean refugees studying the Scriptures with him, including 60 leaders that he is training.  Abe believes that Christ is the only hope for Eritrea, which is under one of the most oppressive regimes in the world.  And he is driven by zeal to train other Eritreans to bring hope to his people.  This weekend will be the first time that Abe has felt that it would be safe to bring Ralph¹s white face into the refugee camp. 

Please pray that God will make Abe and the 60 leaders he is training into oaks of righteousness who will bring hope to their people.  (Isaiah 61:3)  Ralph and Tim will be with Abe and others there for these next 2 weeks. 

Prayer request:   I believe that Navigators are at our best when we invest in movements of the Gospel like this one among Eritreans.  It is one thing to start a movement.  It is another to sustain it.  Renee and I saw this during our two weeks in the Middle East and North Africa.  The leader of our work there is a former Mu*sl*im preacher.  There are thousands of Mu*sli*ms becoming Christians in Algeria.  But they are going out the back door of churches nearly as quickly as they come in the front door, because they are not being discipled.  However, we are there to make disciples, and now there are many former M*usl*ims in Algeria who are ripe to become true disciples who will sustain movements of the Gospel.  Our entire trip in that region was inspiring and sobering.  Whenever you hear the news of chaos and violence in that region, please pray that Navigators will start and sustain more and more movements of the Gospel there.