MOOSE JAW — Hillcrest Apostolic Church is hosting a supper to help resident Bernie Dombowsky raise funds to hire more educators in the Dominican Republic to teach an evangelistic outreach program.
The fall supper for “Un Mañana Brillante/Brighter Tomorrow Outreach” takes place on Thursday, Oct. 3 and Friday, Oct. 4, from 4 to 6:30 p.m., with Charlotte’s Catering providing roast turkey with all the trimmings.
Tickets are $25 for adults over age 17 and $10 for youths under age 16. Tickets can be purchased online and paid either by e-transfer at [email protected] or at the door. If paying in person, text 306-694-0077 confirming the number of tickets and the day attending.
Dombowsky explained that he was on vacation in the Dominican Republic in 2010 when he met a young evangelist, and they began discussing the country’s education system. They eventually agreed to plan a children’s outreach program in the country using a child evangelism program that Saskatchewan churches had developed.
A year later, Regina pastor Jerry Durston took his two nephews and Dombowsky’s son to the country to teach residents how to implement the program. Those newly taught evangelists began leading the program in churches and private schools. They eventually gained access to teaching in public schools.
In 2016, the Dominican Republic’s director of education issued written authorization giving the Canadian evangelism team permission to teach the curriculum in public schools in Sosúa and Porta Plata.
The public system did not have a religious education program but was interested in having one and was pleased to have Un Mañana Brillante teachers provide it.
“We were filling the void that was there,” Dombowsky said.
Urien, one of the program’s teachers, said in a video that he attended the high school in Porta Plata when it had about 400 students, but it now had 937 youths.
“… I feel so happy to be teaching the Word of God to them … . We teach students from (kindergarten) to Grade 12 about Jesus and God,” he said. “We also teach them how to pray and sing worship songs. Our students love to sing.”
The Un Mañana Brillante team — comprised of eight teachers — taught in roughly 400 classrooms last year and reached about 9,000 students, Urien said. The country’s education director supports the team’s work so much that he has permitted it to teach in all the public schools in the Northern Coastal District, which has more than 30,000 students.
“The harvest is ripe, but the labourers are few. We are praying for additional teachers to meet this need,” he added.
Dombowsky noted that Un Mañana Brillante needs to double its teaching capacity to reach all those additional students. For example, some schools in the district have between 340 and 750 youths.
While having twice as many teachers on the team doesn’t mean they will reach all the students in one year, the group would do its best and what it could with the human resources it had, he added.
To reach all students, the team divides into smaller sub-groups and then follows a weekly schedule when visiting each school.
“The teachers of each classroom are expecting (us) … and gladly invite us in for our 20- to 30-minute presentations,” said Urien. “We always ask a student to open in prayer. We (then) sing or listen to a worship song and then listen to the audio story.”
The teams ask questions to generate discussion, with their goal to “clearly present Jesus as the way, the truth and the light,” he added. Some students will ask for prayer, while team members are excited when youths decide to commit their lives to Christ.
Visit www.brightertomorrowoutreach.com for more information.
