Pastor Fresnel Auguste leaned over during church one morning in Haiti and said to me, “you didn’t teach him.” What my friend was saying to me was that the young man in front of us who was leading the Sunday school class for the morning had been taught by those in the church who had been students of mine. Brian, your students have gone on to train others. This is one of them in front of you now.
Now, I like to teach. And, as founder of the discipleship ministry Seedtime and Harvest, that should not surprise anyone. But it did surprise me a little to hear this statement from Pastor Fresnel Auguste. Seedtime is a teaching ministry and as such we can go a long time without seeing much fruit from our work. Some Missions can go to a place, take photos of the land before the missions team builds a church or drills their water well, and then just days later, take another photo of significant measurable progress. In a teaching type ministry, this is a real challenge.
I had been invited on several occasions to this church to teach and preach. They were a great bunch, always faithful to participate well. Yet as a teacher, you hope to see them faithfully continue to learn the Bible’s lessons, apply it to themselves and finally to teach someone else, just as we had come to them to teach. That for us would be the harvest. And in most cases, we get very little feedback and may wait a long time for just a glimpse of the impact of our work. This…was one of those days, and it made my heart glad.
By Brian Winzenried
Learn more about Seedtime and Harvest Ministry and Brian and Laurie Winzenried.
