Pray Prepare Preach: fighting the famine

We regularly receive appeals in the West to help feed the poor and hungry of the world. But we understand by faith that there is a greater famine going on, a famine of hearing the life-giving, soul-nourishing Word of God.

Even in countries where there are packed and thriving churches, very often the pastors have little training and a poor grasp of how to teach the Bible properly. This makes many Christians, in Africa and elsewhere, extremely vulnerable to false teachers and prosperity gospels.

There are a number of great organisations working to help pastors worldwide teach the Bible. Langham Preaching, Project Timothy and Pastor Training International are three such organisations. Pray Prepare Preach (PPP) is a project born from a passion to see the church worldwide growing deeper and stronger in the Word of God.

Easy English

The aim is to provide a series of easy English books giving simple study aids and a basic structure for a talk that a minister can make his own through the use of local illustrations. The project was started by Phil Crowter, who, working with the Good Book Company, produced two guides to preaching through Mark’s Gospel. These first editions sold 20,000 copies each, and have found their way into the hands of working pastors all over the world.

Low cost

The need to be clear, simple, direct and easily accessible means that these books are available at low cost. They are often distributed through mission organisations. One British pastor involved in training said: ‘Preaching Mark is ideal for the people I work with. It was extremely well received and was seen as much more useful than some of the larger books, because it is accessible and useful to the many participants in our preachers' clubs who have no reading culture, and would be intimidated by larger books or commentaries.’

One congregation was so pleased with the Preaching Mark series that they asked their pastor to do it all over again.

We are even more excited by the potential for a new book just out in the series. God’s Big Story is an attempt to trace the story line of the Bible from creation to the new creation.

There is great anticipation already. Another pastor trainer said: ‘I have just come back from Ghana, where the brothers were very excited at the prospect of receiving Preaching God's Big Story! They agree with me that this book is very much needed.’

Long-term plans

Over the next few years, we hope to produce books to cover each type of Bible book. Philippians and Job are in preparation, and writers are developing some other titles in the series. Writing these resources is not easy! It is very hard work to express the often complex ideas of a Bible passage in a simple and clear way — and with a vocabulary set of only 2,000 words! Please pray for the editors and writers as they work on these projects.

Translations of the books in the series are in progress in Hindi, Burmese, Spanish and Serbian.

Radio programmes

Grace Baptist Mission is airing Preaching Mark as a radio programme in India and Africa, aiming at building up local pastors. Pray that God will use these to help and strengthen his church in these countries.

Can you help?

You can be part of this project. You may know of places where these books could be used. You may want to try them yourself in Bible study. Please visit http://www.thegoodbook.co.uk for more information on Preaching God’s Big Story and Preaching Mark. Or contact rosiecrowter@dsl.pipex.com for further details.

We also want to develop prayer groups to support this work. Please let Rosie know if you are interested in receiving prayer letters or being involved in any way.

Dr. Rosie Crowter, Papua New Guinea,
& Tim Thornborough, The Good Book Company