Timothy Leadership Training

Timothy was trained in ministry by the Apostle Paul and called upon to train others (II Timothy 2:2) so that the church would have an on-going supply of focused, disciplined and hard-working leaders. This makes the use of his name with a new leadership training material very appropriate. Although this material was developed for untrained pastors in Africa, it is now being used in Asia, Latin America, Europe and North America as well. In fact, Timothy Leadership Training (TLT) is present in 48 countries around the world. The genius of the method is two-fold: inductive approach and action planning.

Many pastors and church planters in the Majority World are gifted by God, passionate to spread the Good News about Jesus and empowered by the Spirit for ministry. However, they have often had little opportunity for formal training. In recognition of this issue there are all sorts of programs of formal and non-formal education offered. It is increasingly clear that lots of information without application and accountability does little good. TLT anticipates that mature Majority World leaders have lots to share with each other, and that the learning will go deeper if students are fully engaged in an interactive learning process. Also a considerable portion of the training time is spent on developing an action plan for implementation of the material and reporting on how the last action plan was lived out. The most important learning, according to TLT, happens after the meeting is over as the work is done.

For more information take a look at the site of Timothy Leadership Training at http://timothyleadershiptraining.org/. This approach grew out of the ministry of CRWM missionary Harold Kallemeyn with deep involvement from Dennis Hoekstra and several now retired faculty members at Calvin Theological Seminary. What do you think of this approach to meeting the training needs of pastors and church planters?