Kekchi Bible Institute Module #3

This week's Kekchi Bible Institute Module was a great success. Over 60 pastors attended from all over Petén. Bob Petzel taught the book of James and Paul Stiefvater taught our first of four Doctrines classes.

The building is the hottest place in Petén. The windows are small and not always open, but situated in a way so that no breeze gets through. You know it's bad when the Guatemalans are complaining about how hot it is! My translator couldn't even make it through the whole day!

My favorite time is Q&A. This is when the Kekchi pastors can ask any question that has been on their mind. There are not opportunities for them to do this with somebody they can trust to show them why they believe what they believe from the Bible.

Day 1 centered around some questions about some Pentecostal churches

and what they had been told by them about receiving the Holy Spirit. Day 2 centered around, "Who was Cain's wife?"

Now, this is a pretty easy answer, however the pastor's wanted to know where in the Bible it said that you can't sleep with your sister. They knew the truth, they just didn't know where to

find it.

In further conversation with them, it came out that they have recently lost several young people from their churches. US missionaries (JWs and Mormons along with Seventh Day Adventists) have been taught a strategy whereby they have these not very important questions in order to "stump the chump." They tell a teenager to go ask their pastor, and when the pastor says that he doesn't know, they get to explain it and appear to know more about the Bible than the Kekchi pastor. Therefore, questions that don't seem very important to US from a theological standpoint, matter greatly to these men who have nowhere to go for answers.

Day 3 questions centered around God's forgiveness and whether or not there exists a sin that God cannot or will not forgive. There was a hidden agenda here that I can't get into, but that was taken care of during a break.

This is one of my favorite things to do. The hard part was simply translating and not taking off on my own to teach. The pastors did however greatly benefit from the experience of the teachers. Our next session is in July.