Aiming for Ethiopia

My article on ‘The Eschatological Anthrōpos in Mark’s Gospel’ has now been published in the online journal Kaleidoscope. It explores the theological anthropology of Mark. You can access it here.

Since my last update (too long ago) several significant things have happened.

1. My wife Kathleen has also successfully completed her Ph.D. work with a thesis (bound and posted on Christmas Eve) on ‘Prophetic Ministry in Jeremiah and Ezekiel’.

2. We’ve moved from Cambridge back to Australia for a few months. This gives us valuable time with our children and grandchildren as well as providing opportunities to prepare for our next phase of ministry.

3. We’ve decided to use our studies initially to teach in a theological college in Africa in 2011-12.

The Ethiopian Graduate School of Theology (EGST) in Addis Ababa is the only institution that provides a graduate-level theological training program in the Horn of Africa. When it was started in 1997, it operated out of small rented facilities with only 15 students enrolled on the single programme offered. Today EGST operates from its own premises with over 100 students enrolled across the five post-graduate programmes offered.

EGST offers Masters’ Degrees and seeks to train leaders to respond to the varied religious traditions of Ethiopia, including tribal religions, Islam and the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. Over the next 10 years, it seeks to become an institution of international standing, known both for its strong academic standards and the quality of men and women it produces to serve churches and society in Ethiopia and beyond. So it requires quality teaching staff who combine academic credibility (they must have PhDs from reputable universities) and experience that is relevant to the training of these students who will have strategic roles in the development of their people, their churches and their country. The current lecturers come from Ethiopia, USA, UK and Sweden, and the Director is an Ethiopian who has studied for many years in the UK.

We’ll be going to Ethiopia with SIM (Serving in Mission), an international, inter-denominational mission agency devoted to planting, strengthening and partnering churches. It is committed to the Bible and what it teaches, dependent on God and people of prayer. It is mission-focused, and concerned about human needs.

SIM has over 100 years experience in helping to place missionaries in countries where there are great needs. Approximately 1600 missionaries are working with SIM at present in over 40 countries throughout Africa, Asia and South America. SIM provides a network of support, a team to work with, local knowledge and experience, and assistance in channelling financial support from overseas to reach the missionary in the country of service. Mission agencies like SIM do not have their own funds to pay salaries to missionaries, but rely on the donations of others, setting up and managing an account for each missionary

The College in Ethiopia is not able to pay salaries to overseas lecturers. The students do pay fees, but as Ethiopia is a poor country, these fees must be kept within reach of what students can pay. The College needs to use the money from fees for its other running costs, and, at present, can only function with the help of partners across the world contributing to the expenses of the missionary lecturers.

In order for Kathleen and me to go and provide the needed teaching assistance, we need to raise 100% of our costs through the kind donations of friends and churches. And at least 50% of that money needs to be raised before we go. Because we will be living in a foreign land we need to cover more than the usual living and housing expenses. Our costs will also include air fares, visas, medical and travel insurance, extra medical costs (e.g., we need to take in the medicines we anticipate needing), teaching resources, SIM administration costs and a component to help towards retirement. If you’d like to share these costs, you can hop along to http://sim.org/and click on the Donate button.