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Training International Pastors

Beginning in 2008, responding to an invitation from the Bishop of the Free Methodist Church in Rwanda, Tom organized a team, and forty pastors were trained, in Kigali, the capital city.  But a trip to the countryside brought him in touch with much poorer pastors with very little education.  God spoke clearly: “These are the pastors I want you to train!”  In 2010, under the umbrella of PHARP, three seminars were held in regional towns.  That fall, in an act of sheer faith, Barnabas Factor was born, and Rev. Dominic Twagirumugabe was called to lead “Barnabas Africa Ministry” (BAM for short).  Our intentional focus has been rural village pastors—the ones overlooked and neglected.  In the years since, nearly 4000 pastors have been trained (by the end of 2018).  We’ve done seminars in five African countries (Rwanda, plus all the bordering nations: Burundi, Tanzania, Uganda and D.R. Congo).  We are head-quartered in Rwanda, and most of our trainings are done in that nation.

In 2016, Tom extended the ministry of Barnabas Factor, by training over 400 pastors in southern India.  A second trip (February, 2018) brought that total to close to 1000 pastors.

Bible Institutes

We like to say “We desire that every pastor receives basic training, and we desire that many pastors can receive intensive training.”  The basic training is done  by teams of trainers, including Tom, Paul and Carolee Ratzlaff (from the USA) and from several African trainers equipped by us.  But now, we support NINE BIBLE INSTITUTES (7 in Africa; 2 in India).   They offer many hundreds of pastors, intensive training; in most cases, a three year program of 25 or more topics covered in three, two-week long “sessions” per year (over three years).  We are now in the process of obtaining accreditation for these Bible Institutes.