We were always sorry that we could not have worked under the Richard Johansons for a training period with them. They were at heart trainers of others. Of course, they were long gone and living in Florida by the time we got to the field. But vestiges of all their training and teaching they left behind. Unfortunately, they had loaded all their important language and teaching materials and books into a big trunk and took it with them on the ship they sailed on to leave Africa because of the approach of the Second World War. That boat sank - they were rescued, but all of their materials and treasures sank to the bottom of the sea, never to be recovered! Such was missions in those early war days!
So when we arrived, we had to start in from zero. A few other missionaries (including Grandpa and Grandma) occupied the mission station during those years after the war, but one by one they left - for retirement in the U.S. or to minister in other areas. And so we had to start at zero in many ways.
Teaching and training others is such an important function in life - wherever you live. All fathers and mothers should train their children, and we did our best with all of you. Parents train by example as well as words. We train through encouraging our children and showing them where they need to avoid pitfalls, through accepting them for who they are, occasionally correcting them and most of all loving them. We meet so many people in our lives here in the States who have no real love in their lives, and usually they are shattered people, living in an unwelcoming society.
Dad and I see you, our now grown children, training your children in the way they should go, and it delights our hearts. We are also surrounded with a level of society which lives without parental training or proper mentoring - and the results are awful. The Scripture tells us that we are to train our children in the way that they should go and when they are old, they will not depart from that. What a great promise!
Going into the situation that we did as new missionaries, we had a lot of training to do. Yusufu told me once that he had never been able to go far in school, but that he had had an education living with us and learning from us. He was just a gangly bush teenager when he came to work for us. He knew nothing and so we started with basics. Sweeping the floor. I had told him to pick up everything and sweep underneath and then put the item back in place. I saw him one day carefully pick up a dropped button, sweep underneath and then put it back again! He certainly learned that lesson well! Bit by bit, he learned to take care of the house and then to cook also. We lived in the bush and could not buy anything so everything had to be made from scratch including our bread. That was one thing I was not good at, making bread. And so Jessie Nehlsen's cook taught Yusufu, and as you can remember he made the best rolls and bread and raised doughnuts in the mission. Many other cooks learned from him also! And that is the kind of teaching we are admonished to do - teach others so that they in turn may teach others also.
Dad was so good at discipling young men in our tribe. He could see possibilities in people and would take them under his wing for a period of time until they could fly on their own. He did this with our young pastors. When they were just boys, Dad took an interest in them and then we sent them on to Bible School. And this training continued until now we have a great many Bobo Madare pastors. This is the way he trained Tite, when he was just a young boy. He was so bright and such a good student. Dad started to teach him English and we helped him get into the right schools. Dad also helped to train him to rein in his temper, as he had a quick temper. Today he is such a blessing to many throughout the world. But it started with basic training many years ago!
We had to work in local languages - French, Bobo, Jula - in order to train people with whom we lived and were involved. Teaching has always been my love and my calling, and so from the first I was involved in various levels of teaching - from children to young people to adults to pastoral training and finally to graduate study. I was blessed to be involved in various forms of teaching: actual teaching classes in French, Jula or Bobo; I also had input in training national teachers in these languages. I taught children and young people and adults. I taught women and men. It was a delight to prepare printed materials for these students in the various languages and then to teach others to teach, thus fulfilling God's Scriptural command - Teach faithful ones, who in turn will teach others. What a blessing for me.
In addition to writing and teaching from books, I was also able to teach by participating in the work of the church. I helped one church to form a Christian Ed committe - something they had never heard of. At their request, I was a member of that committee for a time to be a model of how it should run. I learned so much during those years - the local people taught me much.
As we all do, I made mistakes. I was pushed to supply Sunday School lessons for our six SS teachers in our district, and so I used a Child Evangelism flannelgraph series. This was exporting something to the church that was not transferrable. If I had it to do over again, I would have started with some basic local illustrations and items which could be better understood locally. I did develop some object lessons later, using local objects available right in their villages, and these worked well. It was my privilege for some years to teach CE at Maranatha Institute to young men and women coming from many areas of Burkina, Ivory Coast and Mali. Those were good years.
Dad was such a great model for the pastors in training and for young men in our area, He went to the bush with them, taught in our dining room at night, using a dull kerosene lamp in the middle of the table. Dad was an evangelist and he took young men with him and train them while doing it. He taught by example and by words and lessons. Everyone loved him.
In the latter years of our ministry in West Africa, when Dad was field director, I took on the task of training new missionaries. I had developed a whole cirriculum for that with lessons taught and recommended books on hand that would help them to learn culture and the ways people learn, etc; how to dress appropriately and act in an African context.
The year we went to Mali, I had the privilege of training our large group of new missionaries there also, using some of these same materials which I had used with our Burkina and Côte d'Ivoire missionaries. We had some great interaction and fun times together in all of these session in all three countries.
In latter years I got involved in TEE and then became Africa director for TEE and travelled extensively in Africa - West Africa, Congo, Gabon - to train others in TEE. Those were interesting, busy and good days! I learned a lot myself.
It was also a delight to me to be a member of the international board of the FATEAC in Abidjan, serving with pastors and teachers from all of our African countires in which we had work. Some of my teaching involved getting better training, and on one occasion I even travelled to Nigeria with an African counterpart. That was a unique experience!
I had the opportunity to serve with CPE and CEFCA in Ivory Coast, and was privileged to know many educators and Christian leaders from many African countires. What a blessing! I taught also for the Baptists in Ivory Coast, Burkina, Mali and Togo. So my teaching life in West Africa was such a blessing to me - I learned much and hopefully taught others some things that they have adapted in their ministry.
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