Dear Brothers
Greetings in the name of our precious Lord and Saviour, Jesus the Christ.
Herewith a brief report on our first Pastor’s Seminar for 2015 held at Crown Cork Hall in Bellville South on 28 February. Allow me first to thank you for all your prayers and those individuals and churches that so generously gave to make this seminar a reality. Thank you for your partnership and for sharing our vision of a continued reformation amongst our Pentecostal and charismatic pastors.
We thank God for men such as Rev. Gideon Beukes who faithfully expounded the Word of God in a way that can only be described as, “…not simply with words but also with power, with the Holy Spirit and deep conviction” (1Thess.1:5). The Lord has truly blessed us.
Our theme was “The Biblical Standard for Leadership”. We usually have three sessions that’s 45min-1hour each. This time we decided to have 2 sessions and to have the 3rd session as a question and answer session. We prepared questions that we thought would deal with issues we are faced with in our communities.
These were:
- What are the qualifications for elders/pastors?
- When is an elder/pastor disqualified to lead and for how long will he remain disqualified?
- Are women allowed to preach in the church and to be appointed as elders/pastors?
- What about men that has been divorced?
- When would it be right to leave a church?
- What are the qualifications for apostles and should we still appoint apostles?
- Is it possible to have such a powerful worship experience that we do not need to preach the Word?
Let me just say brothers, these questions came from the pastors and their wives. The reason we prepared questions was so that we could get participation from the pastors who attended. I was able to ask the first question and thereafter we could see hands going up amongst the pastors and their wives. These questions are the issues that the Pentecostal churches are confronted with and it was a huge blessing to see them ask these questions themselves.
God used Gideon in an amazing way as he pointed people to the scriptures in a humble and understanding way. He addressed all questions from the premise of two questions. What’s the motive and what would bring God most honour and glory.
The way he dealt with the questions made people look at their own motives and their heart towards God while gently, yet very directly pointing them to the scriptures. This was really a work from God.
During lunch the pastors set in small groups continuing the discussion of what they learned and how the Lord has met with them. One pastor who has several churches reporting to him said that his leadership wanted to ordain him as an apostle and that he is thankful to God that he told them to wait until he got clarity on this. Now he can go back to them with the word of the Lord. He also mentioned that he got answers for things that he struggled with for more than 30 years. Praise Jesus!
We were encouraged by one of the pastors to continue with these seminars, because it has impacted his life and ministry in ways that we would never know. We had many such encouragements from several of the pastors to continue the good work. These types of testimonies and encouragements points to the amazing grace that God has bestowed upon us by allowing us with the support of our Sola 5 churches to continue in this ministry. Truly the Lord has set this open door before us, which only He can close.
Every race that the Lord sets us on is certainly not clear of obstacles.
There are some of the Pentecostal pastors that are not happy with these seminars. The main reason would be pride and simply the fact that we or shall I say the Scriptures challenges many of the traditions and teachings that they hold to. They are also very upset that we don’t give them a platform to preach or promote their ministries.
This impacts on the attendance to the seminar as these men would encourage other pastors not to attend. We do not promote any denomination or church at these seminars. We only promote the Word of God.
By the grace of God we are able to offer these seminars free of charge and to provide free books, with free lunch. We will continue to do this until the Lord closes the door.
Please pray for us and for the pastors that regularly attend.
- Pray that the Lord would change and /or expose the hearts of those that would try to influence other pastors not to attend the seminars.
- Pray that the Lord would bring in a mighty harvest amongst those unregenerate pastors that also attend.
- Pray that the Lord would reform the hearts of these pastors and in so doing reform their congregations.
- Pray that the Lord would give us wisdom and much patience as we deal with these pastors.
- Pray that the Lord would help us to walk worthy of His call and not to bring shame to His name.
Good news: As a result of the Pastor’s Seminars one of the brothers who regularly attend, evangelist Theodore and Wilfred has enrolled at BISA (Bible Institute of South Africa) and is students in their Christian Leadership Programme. Praise God for fruit that remain.
Our ministry is small and the work is huge… Christ is our sufficiency!
Soli Deo Gloria
Yours in His service
Mario Maneville
Reformed Faith Mission Community Church