“You should check this out…”, said one of our team members two weeks ago during our business training in the Middle East. She showed me a collage of the 16 year old girl Farousha (name changed) on leadership we taught the previous day. She had captured the difference between a servant leader and an authoritarian leader in Arabic and English! With pictures included!
I was stunned! So special!
A 16 year old girl, who had to flee from a neighboring country, lives in a small house with 12 family members and has little “natural” hope of a future. She does not look at her circumstances but perseveres and invests in herself and focuses on God.
After visiting her family, she said she would like to start a business that would print bible verses on hoodies. She wants to develop this as a side job, next to her studies.
This is one of the many inspiring stories we heard. Two weeks ago we trained 35 Arabs in how to start businesses while planting new churches.
The first two days we taught about God being the Owner of our businesses and we His stewards. We shared how to involve God in our business and how we can combine business and church.
The last three days we talked about finding a good business idea, writing a business plan, sales, marketing, problem solving, leadership, creating a personal and business budget and finding funding to start our business.
Below you see a photo of all the business ideas from the group. 50 in total!
In the coming weeks, the participants will do market research and write their business plans. They will be coached by a group of 6 to 7 local leaders. We coach these local leaders and so the work multiplies.
