Positive Deviants

   I spent all of last week above Colorado Springs in intense training sessions with some of the leaders of the CHE (Community Health Evangelism) movement, which is so effective it is spreading rapidly around the world as various denominations and missions groups adopt its methods. Saddleback Church with Rick Warren, for instance, is using the CHE development program in the Peace Initiative in Rwanda.

    CHE is a unique neighborhood (or village) approach that seamlessly integrates Scriptural stories with practical preventive healthcare (or microenterprise) lessons that are advanced by trained village nationals who relate (ideally) to 10-15 households. There may be other groups that are doing this kind of integration—I’ve witnessed all kinds of relief and development initiatives around the world in my travels as a journalist—but, generally they lean toward one pole or another, development and relief on the one hand, or church planting on the other. Click here to read more: http://goo.gl/KzrcC