Telling Our Story

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• Telling Our Story
• TOPIC BRASIL

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Manila 1999 projected Costa Rica 2000.

• Of the 90 Costa Rica 2000 participants, 18 were
  from Brazil.
• This Brazilian group planned the First Brazilian
  Consultation, held in Anápolis, 2001.

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Anápolis, Goiás
2001, August 21- 24
49 different ministries
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Campinas TOPIC Brasil taking shape
2nd Consultation, 2002 - principles and
competencies
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Campinas TOPIC taking shape
Third Consultation, 2003 legal organization
Fourth Consultation, 2004 - maturing mission,
focus and principles
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Some Pioneers

• Topic Executive Secretary, Juracy Bahia.
• Former CEE Coordinator, Mara Lau.
• Topic President, David Kornfield.

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Pioneers Outside

• Muller, a pioneer of Topic Brasil, moved to
  Africa and now is helping to build Topic there.

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Teachers and Speakers of the Fourth Consultation

• Ari, Juracy, Lowell, Eliza, Walter, John,
  Josadak, Osmar and João.

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Involved in Topic Brazil

• 275 persons enrolled
• 123 persons active
• 40 persons committed

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Identity
We are a Brazilian Alliance of Trainers of
Pastors"
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Vision

• Each church with an Equipped and Maturing
  Pastoral Leader"
• or
• An EMPL in each church"

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Mission

• To enable the equipping of pastoral leaders by
  strengthening, improving and increasing training
  networks"

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Helping to develop a denominational trainers
network

• (PCCP - Baptist Pastors Program for Continued
  Capacitation)

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Focus

• Those with fewer opportunities

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Coordinators of the CEE

• Ariovaldo and Lowell

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CEE June, 2005

• Eliza, Mara, Michael, Samuel, Josadak, Ari and
  Lowell

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Training Modules

• In 2003, CEE worked for six days with 22
  trainers, using two modules one about eight
  competencies of an EMPL, and the other about the
  first of these competencies, Relationship with
  God.

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Training in Experiential Education

• Under CEE leadership, 12 participants worked on
  how to develop a module that trains in an
  experiential manner (Petrópolis, 2004).

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Eight Competencies (See p.2)

• The EMPL in relationship to God
• The EMPL in relationship to himself
• The EMPL in relationship to his family
• The EMPL in relationship to his leaders
• The EMPL in relationship to his church
• The EMPL in relationship to the world
• The EMPL as a person of the Word
• The EMPL as an equipper, trainer and mentor

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Principles (p. 6)
GOD
Selection Discipler Disciple
Follow-up
LearningDynamics
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Principles

• Selection (1) With criteria that help identify
  in whom to invest.
• God as the source and focus of our formation.
  This includes
• (2) The Holy Spirit as the Master Teacher. There
  should be flexibility and discernment to allow
  the Holy Spirit to teach and reveal what He
  wishes.
• (3) The Word of God as our foundation and
  principal tool.

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Principles

• A discipler/mentor/pastoral leader. This person
  should be characterized by being
• (4) Relational, having a committed and personal
  relationship with the EMPL, be it individually
  and/or in a small group, connecting with both the
  leaders life and ministry.
• (5) An example being a model or living
  demonstration of what he wants to teach.
• (6) A facilitator enabling people to learn (and
  teach), through personal discovery, what most
  interests them.
• (7) Contextual adapting the instruction
  according to the maturity, ability, situation and
  needs of the participants.

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Principles

• The disciple. This includes
• (8) Active participation, with interactive
  methods and material that stimulate
  participation.
• (9) Competence growing in character (being),
  ability (doing) and knowledge (knowing).
• (10) Teachable the desire and commitment to
  always be growing, searching for learning
  opportunities.

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Principles

• The learning process. This includes
• (11) Evaluation Based on the EMPLs personal and
  ministerial growth, rooted in self-evaluation and
  enhanced by the perspective of those to whom he
  ministers, his peers and his instructor/mentor/dis
  cipler.
• (12) Small groups experiential, interactive
  training, developed in the context of reflection
  and shared assessment.
• (13) Transferable concepts simple enough to be
  easily remembered, used and passed on to others.
• Follow-up (14) Designing steps for putting what
  is learned into practice after the training
  event.

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Strengths of TOPIC Brasil

• 1) Vision and determination (persistence in spite
  of obstacles)
• 2) Concepts, philosophy and modules
• 3) The accumulated ministerial and training
  experience of our associates
• 4) Our networks throughout Brazil

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Strengths of TOPIC Brazil

• 5) Diversity with consequent richness of
  cross-fertilization and relationships
• 6) Disposition to learn (continually), people
  returning to annual consultations
• 7) Veterans, a committed and competent nucleus
• 8) Formal legal organization of TOPIC Brazil

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Opportunities

• 1) Raising a vision of a new training philosophy
  with key concepts such as mentoring and adult
  education principles
• 2) Developing and multiplying (weekend) modules
  for training pastoral leaders.
• 3) Exploring new training methods distance
  learning, radio, internet, videos
• 4) Stimulating reflection on pastoral training
  through forums and research

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Opportunities

• 5) Mobilizing and networking trainers of pastors
  in Portuguese-speaking countries
• 6) Offering concrete services to pastoral
  trainers such as in designing training modules
  and making tools more available.
• 7) Encouraging and enabling trainers in sharing
  their knowledge and experience.
• 8) Raising denominational and organizational
  awareness of the importance, value and need for
  pastoral training.

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For more details about Topic Brasil, access
www.topicbrasil.org Come join us in our fifth
yearly consultation - March 30 to April 2, 2006
in São Paulo!