It Feels Good to Get Something Done

Three years ago I was invited to speak at a conference on the Holy Spirit in Turkey. Being invited to speak anywhere is exciting. Being invited to speak on the Holy Spirit is really exciting. But being asked to do it for the Christians in Turkey, which is 99.7% Muslim, is downright cool.

A year later I was invited back to lead conferences for Turkish pastors and church leaders in two cities. I will be going back to do the same again in September.

There are fewer than 100 churches in Turkey, a country of over 70 million people. About half of the churches are in Istanbul. Few of them have been in existence longer than about ten years. As a result, there are very few experienced pastors in Turkey. There are also very few Christian books available in Turkish, and none that I know of on the practical aspects of administering a church. That may explain why my talks on that subject were so well received.

In the last year I have been working intermittently on expanding my notes into a book that can be translated and made available to Turkish pastors and church leaders. It will be in three sections, on the pastor, the local church, and the wider church. This morning I hit a milestone. I finished the first draft of the first section!

I know what you're thinking. "You've been working a year, and you just finished the first draft of the first third of the book?" In a word, yes. And it feels good. If you've ever worked a long time of a big project, you can identify.

Please pray that it is useful, and that I finish the rest of it more quickly. (As many of you know, the biggest problem is setting aside time to work on it regularly.)
And please pray for God's work in Turkey.