By: Klint Ostermann, Founder

West Africa has one accredited Farming God’s Way trainer. One man, a missionary named Tom, carrying an entire region. I have been traveling to Senegal alongside Tom for three years now, helping him build something that could outlast both of us. Recently, I made the trip one more time.

Nine days. Two villages. Eighteen trainers. And a result that three years of work had been quietly building toward.

Three Years of Groundwork

When Tom and I started this work together, the gap was stark. Uganda alone has twenty accredited Farming God’s Way trainers. West Africa had one. The region is vast, the need is enormous and the spiritual stakes could not be higher. Roughly 97% of the population is Muslim. Getting the gospel into these communities requires workers who are already there, already trusted and already equipped.

Over those three years, Tom and I have been working with a growing group of trainers across West and Central Africa, coaching them, sharpening their skills and walking with them toward accreditation. Six of those men were ready to go up for accreditation on this trip: Benjamin and Masra from Chad, Tamou from Mali, David from Benin and Benard from Cameroon.

These are not men who stumbled into Farming God’s Way. They are men who have already led people to Jesus through it, working in Muslim-dominated areas where the gospel does not arrive easily. We were not starting from scratch with them. We were sharpening what God had already been doing.

What Happened in Those Villages

The In-Field Mentoring event brought together 18 trainers seeking accreditation from eight countries: Senegal, The Gambia, Cameroon, Chad, Mali, Equatorial Guinea, Belgium and Benin. Together, we facilitated two complete Farming God’s Way trainings in remote Senegalese villages. Around 80 people attended across both events, many of them walking in from surrounding communities, drawn by word that something was happening on the land.

Four of those attendees gave their lives to Christ during the training! That number deserves a moment.

In a region that is 97% Muslim, four people heard the gospel proclaimed through the practical work of tending the earth and responded.

This is the integration that Farming God’s Way is built around. The field is not a backdrop for ministry. It is the ministry. Faithful work becomes visible before words are spoken.

“Let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.” Matthew 5:16

All Six Were Accredited

All six men — Benjamin, Masra, Tamou, David, Benard and Tom’s fellow American missionary, Aaron, based in Senegal— passed accreditation.

I want to be clear about what that means, because it is easy to read it as a credential and miss the weight of it. An accredited Farming God’s Way trainer can now mentor other trainers toward accreditation. That is the multiplication engine. Tom could not be in six places at once. But now these six men can be. Each of them can raise up the next generation of trainers across countries that Tom and I will never set foot in.

Mali and Burkina Faso are effectively closed to American missionaries. Tom cannot go there, bu Tamou can. Benard knows Cameroon. David knows Benin.

The gospel does not need a welcome passport. It needs faithful people who are already home.

Three years of work just produced six of them.

The Others Who Are Still on the Journey

Not every trainer who came to Senegal left with accreditation, and that is as it should be. Accreditation is earned, not distributed. But every trainer who participated left sharper, having received solid coaching, field-based correction and honest feedback from someone watching them teach in real time. These trainers are on the path, and they now have six newly accredited peers to learn from and be mentored by. That is the system working exactly as designed.

A Passing of the Baton

This was my last trip to West Africa for the foreseeable future. I am not stepping away from what God built there. I am stepping back because what God built there can now run without me. Tom, Benjamin, Masra, Tamou, David, Benard and Aaron will carry it from here. That is exactly how it is supposed to work.

Sow Hope Farms exists to equip missionaries, pastors and leaders with Farming God’s Way, preparing them to use agriculture as a missions tool to break poverty, disciple communities and share the gospel with people groups around the world. Senegal was not an exception to that mission. It was a picture of it. And now seven trained, faithful men are fanning the flames we started three years ago across West and Central Africa.

This is what multiplication looks like. This is why we train.

If you want to be part of equipping the next Benjamin, Tamou, or Masra, we would love to have you with us. Give today and sow hope into regions that are waiting for workers.