Association of Evangelicals in Africa

AEA Strategic Review in Sierra Leone

                                 

                  REGIONAL  EVALUATION  MEETING

   DAY  ONE –Wednesday  3^rd   October, 2007

Devotion:

 Praise and Worship

The meeting stated at 8:00am with Praise   and worship led Mrs Kumba Johnson

 Exaltation

 Rev .Jonathan Titus Williams of EFSL   used Matthew 16:13-20  to exalt the participants.  He centred  his  exaltation  on the  topic “Public opinion  about  the Christians”. Rev Titus Williams said Many   Christians walk blindly in communities not paying attention  to what people  say  about  them. He advised  participants  to be  sensitive  to  what People  say  about them because as he put it  the people may be  saying valuable things about  them which will be  useful for their growth.  He however said  Christians should know that  it is not everything  people say  about them will be correct so there is need  to listen to the people’s view points and   pick  out  the  correct ideas   that may be  used for personal development

  Brief back ground  to  AEA current  situations 

   The  host of the meeting   Mr. Aiah  Foday –Khabenje who is  also  the General  Secretary  of EFSL  gave  a brief   back  ground  of the  evaluation meeting. He   said that AEA is currently  faced with leadership  crisis.  Mr Khabenje  said  since  Mr  Tokubu left  AEA   there has  been leadership   problem,  because he failed to put  in place a workable transition plan.   The  General  Secretary of EFSL  said Mr . Torkubu’s  sucessors Mr.  Betrus failed to raise the much needed resources to  run AEA.    After  few years of  service    Mr. Khabenje said  Mr. Betrus  left AEA, creating a leadership vacuum.

He said at the moment AEA is run  by  serving staff  and by every indications  these staff  have been rated  as  doing  an excellent   job.

 Mr. Foday-Khabeje said  AEA  is faced  with financial  difficulty, as  a result  it  was not able to pay for representatives  from National bodies to attend   AEA   40^th  anniversary. He  said  the  EFSL paid   for  its representative to attend  the  anniversary. After  the  anniversary  celebration, members agreed  to  hold a regional strategic evaluation meeting to reflect  on AEA  before  the General  council meeting.

Mr. Foday –khabenje  said   the strategic  meeting  for  west Africa  was  designed to  draw participants from Liberia, Sierra Leone, Ghana  and Nigeria.

He  wellomed all participants  to the meeting  and encouraged all to make meaningful contributions.

 Statement by  Rev. Shrodankeh Johnson  President of  EFSL

  Rev. Shrodankeh  welcomed all to the meeting  and  said  he felt happy  to be  part  of the process. He  said  his  daily prayer is to  be  part  of  the development of sierra  leone  nationally and internationally.   Rev. Shrodankeh said in he believes in   the concept of let  God  kingdom come on earth  as in heaven. According  him,  while  on earth Christians  have responsibilities  to establish   God  kingdom on  earth.  Rev. shrodankeh said the church should be  relevant  to the community. He  illustrated  this with a story of   rich  church  in   community full of poor people.

  In  his illustration  he said  there was a church  that was attended only by  rich people. This  church was located in a community   with poor people. The pastors and the church members  never  reached out  to the people in the community.  The poor too were never  attended the church.  There was a change in the leadership of the church.   One day  the new  Pastor  went out to the  community to evangelise.  The  first person  the Pastor  met was  a  farmer in his farm. The  Pastor  extended his  to greet the farmer but  the  farmer said my hands are dirty. The  pastor  said  give  me your hand  have   so many rivers to wash my hands, in response the farmers  shook  his  hand . Next the Pastor went to  another  farmer and did the  same thing. The visit  of the  Pastor  in that  community encouraged   the poor  to come to  saving  knowledge  of Jesus Christ.

According to Rev Johnson the lesson learnt from this  illustration is that  Christians  should reach  out to the poor, rich , high class , middle class with  the word of God.

Rev  Johnson said his  Ministry  believes  in  high impact  program  but low visibility. He cited  one of  the projects ( Esther  Project ) which targets  disadvantaged women  in the project location. The project targets mainly   prostitutes,  with  the  aim of   moving them   from the  street, lead them to Christ and help   them  to start  micro enterprises. One  of the successes  of this project  is that  most of the women have now left the prostitution  and  are believers in Christ Jesus.

 Rev. Shrodakeh Johnson said  Evangelicals  have a role to play  on earth that helping  people to  come to Jesus Christ.

Facilitators  Remarks

The  Facilitator  thanked Sierra Leonean  for  a Peaceful out come of  Parliamentary  and Presidential elections. He  informed  participants about the  pending regional and  Board  meetings . The Facilitator encouraged participant to take  this strategic evaluation meeting  as a learning  process. He said  the  participants should ensure that  National  body succeeds,  because in his words,  its success will  means success for the continental  body(AEA).