Men of peace

When Jesus sent His disciples out two by two to preach the gospel, He told them to watch out (see Luke chapter 10) for "men of peace" who would help them in every town that they came to. Over these past three days in Dakar, a man called Germain, philosophy teacher and president of the Christian Union movement in Senegal, has been that sort of person for us. From his wide network of Christian leaders, he has made phone calls and helped set up appointments for us to meet a variety of pastors and other leading Christians here in the city. At church this morning, and in a number of individual meetings over the coming days, we are connecting with ministers responsible for churches in Dakar and whole denominations here in the nation. What a joy it was for me to discover that one of them, the Baptist minister, had been a teenage boy on one of our King's Kids teams here in Senegal in the 1990s. I remember that he and his sister were with us when we took teams of African young people to minister with African American churches in Atlanta during the 1996 Olympic Games. It's my prayer that some of the young people who take part in our outreaches this summer, 2013, will also be the pastors, missionaries and Christian businessmen of the next generation.