Good Aussies over here

Mark and Jo Dennett introduced themselves to us at church on our first Sunday here. They are sent from Christian city Church in Whitehorse, Melbourne; here since October 2006 to work with churches and business people towards seeing Cambodian churches sustain themselves. 'Over 80% of Cambodian churches are dependent on western donor money to exist' Mark says.

Mark is an engineer by background; Jo a psychologist and counsellor. Together with their home church (which, interestingly, has put all its missions eggs into a one-nation basket: Cambodia) they have developed excellent resources and a well thought-through strategy to encourage the Cambodian church towards self-sustainability.

Learning vision principles - a hilarious exercise that makes multiple application points!

Mark and Jo enjoying a giggle during the 'Vision' forum

At the heart of the strategy are monthly half-day forums and weekly mentoring groups. The weekly groups have a mix of church pastors and business people in them - about eight people in total per group. I have accepted an invitation to be involved in a mentoring group. There are pastoral leaders from the church Sue and I attend in my group, as well as business people. Frank, who is worthy of a separate blog introduction, balances the group as he is one proficient business guy in a culture that is very interesting to manage a business in.

The monthly half-day forums are held 8am-12noon on a Saturday, followed by lunch together. Today was my intro - a very well put-together session on vision and planning. Mark and Jo mixed it up with a lot of small-group interaction, practical application stuff and good written material. Well done, guys!