Press on!

Missionary.  That’s a loose term.  I serve as Provost & Associate Director of World Hope Bible Institute (www.trainapastor.org).  Pictured above is a group of my first students in Lemoru, Kenya near the Ugandan border (April 2012).  Can you find me in the picture? I am wearing the green necktie. We also have an orphanage and a school for children there. Below is from my most recent travel where I taught a course in Christian Apologetics to about 50 pastors and ministry leaders in Kitengela Town, Kenya (December 2018). See if you can find me. I’m wearing a black shirt.

My job is to travel about 60 days a year for the institute, training remote and underserved pastors in Systematic Theology and opening new campus locations in places as far away as Mt. Kilimanjaro and the Amazon Basin.  I know, it sounds pretty exotic. Below is a shot me and my students in the jungle near Guwahati, India, which is a few hundred kilometers east of Kathmandu, Nepal. Can you find me in this one? Look for the pink shirt.

It all started back in 2012 when I ran into a couple of old friends at a local eatery.  Stuart Sheehan and Dwight Davis, President and Vice President of World Hope respectively, were enjoying a spot of lunch.  I was hosting a financial planning seminar in the restaurant’s conference facility and came out for a breather.  Bumping into Stuart and Dwight, the latter of whose father, the late Dr. Harold Davis, was a former Texas State Senator and founder of World Hope, would be a life changer for me.  We caught up on the latest gossip, and then Stuart said, “I need you to go to Indonesia and teach for the Bible Institute next summer.”  I said “no problem,” and left it at that.  Two weeks on the mission field and I was hooked.  Within a few months, I accepted the call to World Hope, stepped down from my pastorate at The Compass, and assumed my new role at the Bible Institute.

World Hope Bible Institute provides free, systematic theological training to pastors and leaders in remote and underserved areas around the world by mobilizing qualified instructors to deliver our high quality curriculum.  On a recent trip to Peru, I met with the governor of Loreto State, the largest state in Peru to discuss the possibility of accreditation for the Bible Institute in Peru.  The process is slow, but we are moving forward.  Pictured below at the Governor’s home (from left to right) is Dr. Darryl Horn, the Governor, and myself.