Allowing Christ to Be Christ: The Power of Training Pastors to Preach

Giving It All for the Good News

For Phillip Egesa and his four friends, college education was a means to an end. As they graduated from college, they asked one another, “How can we use our education qualifications to preach the gospel throughout Uganda?”

This desire started in Phillip when he was a child. After seeing two of his young cousins die on the same day for unexplained reasons, Phillip started to fear for his own life. He recalls that “immediately after the burial, I started hearing a spirit talk to me. I could hear a voice, but I couldn’t see it.” He was tormented by these near-constant voices that he couldn’t seem to quiet, no matter what he did. Eventually, by himself one Sunday morning, he sought solace in the neighborhood church.

I don’t even remember what the preacher talked about, but I remember him asking if anyone wanted to give their lives to Christ. And I raised my hand. I walked alone to the front of the church with tears rolling down my cheeks. I repeated a confession prayer. And when I said, “Jesus, come into my life, be my Lord and my Savior,” it felt like power hit me. I fell down to the ground. And then when I stood up, I felt like something had been lifted. And that’s how my life turned around.

Despite bets between his siblings about how quickly he would return to his own ways, Phillip was changed from that moment forward. So when Phillip’s friends met after graduation and considered starting a ministry effort together, Phillip’s answer was immediately, “yes.” He knew God would fill in any gaps and uncertainties.

And after twenty years, Phillip looks back today and sees how God in his providence has in fact filled in the gaps and grown their ministry beyond what he could have imagined. With ten church plants coming from the one church they started initially in 2012, gospel seeds are being planted all around the country.

Each of the church plants have pastors over their congregations, but none of those ten pastors have received a theological education. Through Crossway’s Global Ministry Fund, pastors’ book sets have been delivered into the hands of each pastor—Phillip included. And the changes Phillip has seen in each of them has encouraged him as he sees that the gospel is being more faithfully preached every Sunday as a result.

Give the Gift of a Bible

Your gift of $3.50 will provide a Bible to someone in need. Crossway is providing one million Bibles to men and women who may not have their own copy. Join us in this effort and allow someone to read God’s Word for themselves. Would you consider partnering with us? Learn More.

A Vision for Revealing Christ

Phillip explained that he and his friends initially began their work by “position[ing] ourselves as professionals who can help organizations that are working with communities to help them train and teach their communities.” This gave them a back door to proclaiming the gospel, even when they were at first only asked to train and teach, often in areas where there was minimal education available. They taught thousands of adults and children about Jesus, and many of these accepted Jesus as their Savior.

But as they did this work, they discovered that people were looking for somewhere to go to be further discipled after coming to faith. Due to a lack of gospel-preaching churches in the area, they felt the Lord calling them to plant a church. They started their first church in 2012. Phillip shared that their vision is rooted in John 10:10: “that all ‘may have life and have it abundantly,’ and our heart for the church work is about showing and revealing Christ to the people—where abundant life comes from.”

He initially played a supporting role for the church and worked elsewhere to provide financially for his family and the church, but that changed when the lead pastor died suddenly in a car accident. Phillip remembers that “when our leader died, the church was still young and the natural question was, ‘What next?’ So I had to take up the leadership. Whether I was called or not, I didn’t know. I just wanted to make sure the work did not die.” Phillip was faithful to what it seemed like the Lord was placing in front of him next.

At the time he took over leadership of the church, plans were already underway for a first church plant. Over time, as their church plants multiplied and he considered how to best support the pastors while giving them leadership and independence, he realized the need for pastoral training was great. He himself had just previously received a theological education, equipping him for shepherding and expositional preaching, and revealing to him what these other pastors didn’t understand.

Each Tuesday morning all eleven pastors meet together on a Zoom call to equip and evaluate one another as they share plans for preaching the following Sunday. “As I listened,” Phillip explained, “I could feel the pain of them not having the training they needed to be able to rightly preach the Word every Sunday. And I couldn’t blame them because none of them had ever gotten the opportunity to be trained.”

Phillip didn’t have the ability to provide them all with formal theological training. But when he learned about Crossway’s pastors’ book sets, accessible to ministry workers like himself, he knew that getting his hands on those books to distribute to the pastors would serve to encourage and equip them.

The Power of a Book Can Proclaim the Good News

Each of the eleven pastors, Phillip included, received a pastor’s book set. Now, every Saturday morning, the pastors get together on a Zoom call dedicated to working through these books together. As soon as they could, they dug into Proclaiming the Word by David Jackman. Phillip is seeing marked improvements in their understanding of expositional preaching as they work through the book together.

Part of what Proclaiming the Word has been helpful with is to improve our confidence in approaching the text of Scripture. It has been able to give us guidance regarding what our roles are so that we don’t cross that boundary—meaning that I don’t become the most important just because I’m a good preacher. My role should be about making sure that the picture of Christ is well painted. We are better understanding the place of the Word in our preaching. It is a process, but we’re learning how to do expository preaching by just using a sample of the guidelines from the book. . . . Personally, the book has helped me to place Christ at the center of my preaching. I can get out of the way and allow Christ to be Christ.

As this group of pastors learns how to “allow Christ to be Christ” in their preaching, they are richly presenting the good news of the gospel to their congregations.

There is great power in the pages of a book, allowing pastors and lay believers alike to learn more about the Lord. Through Crossway’s Global Ministry Fund, thousands of books are distributed every year to many like Phillip. As a result, believers are better equipped to share Jesus and know Jesus for themselves.

Pray that Phillip and the pastors in his ministry network will remain faithful to preaching God’s Word and to the purpose he has called them as messengers of the gospel.

Pray for the thousands of book sets distributed to pastors around the world to make an impact for the sake of the Kingdom.