“Finally, all of you, live in harmony with one another; be sympathetic, love as brothers, be compassionate and humble.” – 1 Peter 3:8

The Community Health Evangelism or CHE as it is popularly known had a 5 days workshop at In Deed And Truth ministry in Tonj. A team of three missionaries based in Uganda and one from Eritrea conducted the workshop. The learners were about 20 Sudanese pastors from Rumbek and Tonj.

CHE workshops are learner centred and this one was no exception. The learners fully participated in discussions  especially when they were divided into small groups of three or four people. The teacher would ask a question to the larger or smaller group that would start off a discussion or raise suggestions. He might also have a role play acted by three or four people or show a picture. By asking particular questions he made the learners come up with solutions to the problems at hand.

The pastors were enlightened on how to think of local solutions to their local problems. This requires one to think of ‘development’ rather than ‘relief’, prevention rather than cure. Diseases such as diarrhea, typhoid, cholera, malaria, malnutrition and others were ranked in occurrence and participants debated their causes, how they could be prevented, etc. It was pointed out that malaria was caused by mosquitoes only and not by eating mangoes or ‘bad food’ as some suggested.

Lapse and reocurrence of diseases in our bodies was likened to the way we sin then for a time think we have conquered it only for us to sin again. A lot more was taught and participants were finally urged to start seed projects in their villages.