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What does it take to see a
group of Kwong women mature spiritually and mentally to a point of being able to
lead other Kwong women? At the
present time I can count on one hand the number of women who can even read
haltingly, and the reading learning curve is simply too steep to rely on reading
as a primary means of teaching women to study the Bible themselves so they can
teach others. So it was with much prayer and reflection that the following two
goals emerged for the women’s work at the beginning of this term.
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 Goal
1: Begin a discipleship class
of 5-10 women, some of whom know how to read haltingly already, and study
the Bible with them with the objective of them being able to teach other
women the same material.
This goal is being realized at the weekly 6:15 a.m. prayer/Bible study for
women which began on Thursday, December 29. This is the first time ever that
such a study has occurred among the Kwong women. We’ve had as few as 3 and
as many as 12 women in attendance, yet it seems to be growing. We memorize
verses, read and talk about the women’s devotional I prepared two years
ago, pray together, and sing a song. I’m really thrilled to see the depth
of spiritual interest in these women.
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 Goal
2:Prepare a weekly women’s program for the radio to address health and
child-rearing topics as well as teach the Bible. At present we have prepared
6 programs hitting on very relevant and culture changing topics.
One of the first topics we address is spreading the truth that a woman not
only can but should nurse her child from day one. The myth in the culture
advocates emptying the breast of its colostrumfor two days, giving the baby
only un-boiled, un filtered water with their hands, because they think the
colostrum will make the baby sick. This we feel this a lie from the pit of
hell itself.
Now, with the radio, thousands of women who have never heard this medical
truth before will hear it. Our hope is that by hearing good teaching of this
nature repeatedly women will little by little feel free to change their
traditions. Likewise we plan to begin AIDS awareness messages from a
Christian perspective with teaching on how to avoid AIDS.
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July 2006
update! Bible Lessons "on the air!" - Combining Goals 1 and
2
In
goal 1 (see above), I began channeling my efforts to disciple a handful of
women both spiritually and academically (i.e. teach them to read), so that
they could one day (5-10 years from now) teach other women from the word of
God authoritatively and coherently. Although I am seeing a spiritual awakening
that was never given vent before, the extremely steep reading learning
curve means it'll sill be 5 to 10 years before these women can effectively
teach others - face to face, that is.
Radio, however, is not “face to face” and continues to surprise us with its incredible
potential. In this case, via the radio, this handful of illiterate women who
do not yet understand Scripture particularly well themselves began teaching
weekly Bible lessons to other women in June on our weekly women's program
(goal 2). How? You might ask. In
this case, I am literally putting the words in their mouths - “Repeat after
me.” Then with the help of high tech digital audio editing I can make these
women sound like learned Bible teachers - “reading” Scripture fluently and
teaching authoritatively and coherently.
 Upon hearing themselves on the first
program, Naomi and Tabitha
exclaimed, “We sound like pastors.” “You are!” I said. “hundreds of
women or even thousands will be listening to your teaching every Monday night.”
They began immediately building their own dreams of traveling to teach in the
various remote villages! We’re still working toward such a 5-10 year goal.
The radio, nevertheless, has given us a medium for such teaching to begin even
now.
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