As a Bear Valley Extension Coordinator it is a blessing worshiping and working with various churches around the brotherhood. While getting ready to return to Chimala, we were raising money for the students at the Chimala Bible Institute through teaching a college class filled with students of a local state university. One of the students in the class, a faithful Christian, said he was taught by a Jewish man in a Christian Origins class that besides the New Testament there were no other places where Jesus was mentioned in the first century. This totally discounts Josephus, an ancient Jewish historian of the first century. My first response was, “Say what?” I then spent the rest of the class giving evidences for the existence of Jesus in the first century.
As we begin the new school year Monday, at worship this morning I was thinking about that incident. Ezekiel Harrison was preaching, one of our fine instructors both in the secondary school and in the Chimala Bible Institute. In the audience this morning was the man who taught him the gospel from his hometown. The brother was able to see how his former convert has advanced here to become one of our students.
Ezekiel, along with Joshua, Boaz, and Xavier, Joseph, as well as, Remmy will be teaching this group of incoming students. Everything from various Biblical books to Hermeneutics to Preacher and his Work, our students will be taught by these men who have spent years, studying, teaching and preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ. All of these evangelists have graduated from the Bear Valley Bible Institute extension program. All have received, or are working on, the Bear Valley Master’s degree. All are faithful, hardworking, sound preachers of the gospel. Oh I am sure they will also have some ”say what” moments in their classes, but I am confident they will also be able to answer the questions that arise. That is why we are eagerly starting another year of the Chimala Bible Institute tomorrow. Another year of preparing the students to answer the objections of the skeptics, and fully proclaim the message of the gospel.
Yes, Ezekiel was preaching, his mentor who taught him the gospel was listening, and another generation of preachers is about to be taught because of the Bear Valley Bible Institute extension program.
Garry L. Hill
Extension Coordinator
Chimala Bible Institute