Ethiopia - Day 2
My day started much earlier than planned. Doggone that jet lag! I woke at 3. I realized it was supper time back home so I called my wife and son and had a fine visit! Then it was time to get busy - our flight to Bahir Dar (far western Ethiopia) was scheduled for 7:10 AM. I got dressed and ready and went to meet the group.
The flight was interesting, as all non-US flights are. We had to go through TSA style security twice - once at the front door and once at the gate. No matter - we survived and made our flight. It's about an hour flight from Addis to Bahir Dar, so it wasn't too bad.
Our plans were to conduct a governmental leadership training event here this afternoon (it's lunch time as I'm writing this) and then meet with pastors tomorrow. We did the same governmental training in Adama last year and it was super well received. That got changed when the governmental leaders were worried. Not that we would talk about Jesus - they would be fine with that. But that we wouldn't do it like THEY wanted us to. Most of them belong to the Coptic church and don't care much for evangelicals in general. I was disappointed at first, but then I realized this gives us a whole afternoon more with the pastors! Woohoo! We were going to tone some of it down for the governmental leaders, but now we're turning it up! It will be a short run - 2-5:30 today - but it's more than we thought we had and we're going to make the most of it!
It's later now and we're back. We had a great afternoon, even without the governmental leaders we had planned for. To the 50-75 pastors who had come, we introduced the concept of servant leadership and what that means. Such is a foreign concept here where leadership means domination. Trying to push back will take more than the time we have, but we must begin somewhere.
I'd never heard of Bahir Dar (the city we're in right now), but it is well known and ancient city in Ethiopia. It sits hard against Lake Tana, about the size of 2 Possum Kingdom Lakes. There are ancient monestarys and the streets are lined with palm trees.
The flight was interesting, as all non-US flights are. We had to go through TSA style security twice - once at the front door and once at the gate. No matter - we survived and made our flight. It's about an hour flight from Addis to Bahir Dar, so it wasn't too bad.
Our plans were to conduct a governmental leadership training event here this afternoon (it's lunch time as I'm writing this) and then meet with pastors tomorrow. We did the same governmental training in Adama last year and it was super well received. That got changed when the governmental leaders were worried. Not that we would talk about Jesus - they would be fine with that. But that we wouldn't do it like THEY wanted us to. Most of them belong to the Coptic church and don't care much for evangelicals in general. I was disappointed at first, but then I realized this gives us a whole afternoon more with the pastors! Woohoo! We were going to tone some of it down for the governmental leaders, but now we're turning it up! It will be a short run - 2-5:30 today - but it's more than we thought we had and we're going to make the most of it!
It's later now and we're back. We had a great afternoon, even without the governmental leaders we had planned for. To the 50-75 pastors who had come, we introduced the concept of servant leadership and what that means. Such is a foreign concept here where leadership means domination. Trying to push back will take more than the time we have, but we must begin somewhere.
I'd never heard of Bahir Dar (the city we're in right now), but it is well known and ancient city in Ethiopia. It sits hard against Lake Tana, about the size of 2 Possum Kingdom Lakes. There are ancient monestarys and the streets are lined with palm trees.
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