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Building at the roof of the world

7:31am Monday, 23rd August 2010

Roz Brain, of International Nepal Fellowship (INF) Australia

Let me introduce you to Divya, the manager of a remote NGO in rural Nepal. He attended a Bible school in northern India and is recognized as the most educated man in his village. He leads his staff in integral mission and manages his responsibilities well, leading by example and making hard decisions alone. But he is increasingly aware that he could benefit from practical teaching to be able to continue to attend to the growing variety of relational and spiritual issues that affect the lives of the people he serves – and he longs for training and support in this.
It was in January 2010 that I met the Pokhara HimLead cohort of men and women with similar concerns and issues. They were attending their second workshop in a series of five specially designed for Christian pastors and leaders in Nepal. This cohort first met in October 2009 and will meet for a total of five workshops over the space of 15 months.
The first workshop discussed how we might better care for our environment and each person wrote a personal Action Plan that they wanted to pursue within their workplace and community.
The value of this accountability is that it encourages the setting of realistic personal and leadership goals.
My participation with this cohort began on the first night of their second workshop, where I heard each participant report back on their action plans. For some, their plan had been eagerly accepted by their congregation or staff. Rupa, a Community Development Manager, enthusiastically shared how, after deciding to clean up the rubbish on the footpath and street in front of her office, the neighbors and eventually the entire street had decided to do so also.
Rupa explains: “I used to live in the city and our church started in a small room. We constructed a building, and the congregation slowly grew to 150 people.
“Everyone worships together: many poor and disabled people came in and became Christians. My work recently took me to a remote rural area where there were no churches. We started a small fellowship which met in a corridor. Finally we were able to rent a room and the number of believers is increasing day by day.
“HimLead is very very useful for me”, Rupa says. “It helps me to be a good leader in my work as well as at church. I shared the lessons from HimLead with people from church and they also learned. This kind of training is very useful for Nepali Christian leaders because it is difficult to follow Jesus in the Nepali culture.”
The themes of the second workshop included Becoming a Servant Leader and Being a Leader of Integrity. Over three days, they explored a variety of leadership styles, gained a deeper understanding of Jesus’ manner of leading by serving, learned about their own leadership style and about how to work with people of different styles. We also examined the absolute need for integrity in leadership, explored the Biblical expression of integrity, and studied the life of Daniel and Saul.
For me, the value of this program with its interactive and practical focus on crucial issues, is that it offers young men and women like Divya and Rupa, a safe and supportive forum to question and develop in their roles as husband/wife, parent, friend, pastor, leader and as sons and daughters of the creator of the Universe.
It was a great privilege for me to be invited into the lives of these people.
Roz Brain currently works as a Pastoral Care Co-ordinator, offering support and counselling to the foreign health and development staff volunteering with the INF .