Greetings to all!! This last year I have tried to keep all those interested in our ministry abreast of the goings on through Face Book. But over the past few weeks I have come to realise that there are a number of folks who are not subscribed to Face Book and are therefore not able to pickup any news. I know that social media has many negative aspects but one of the great positives is that I have been able to communicate with many folks about missionary life up here in Mbala. And so I have decided to start writing some of these things on my blog. For about a year I had trouble with Live Writer that I use. It simply would not work on my new computer. Well my new computer died forcing me to return to my old faithful and Live Writer still functions on this. So here I am back.
“And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable men who will be qualified to teach others” 2 Timothy 2:2
For many years living and ministering here in Mbala I come more under the conviction that many of the folks that I have been teaching have a very simple literacy. What I mean is that many of them are able to read and write but are not really able to comprehend what they have read or really struggle doing so. In the culture that I come from a lot of what I have learnt about my walk from the Lord has come through the written Word and various other books dealing with certain aspects of our faith. We are so blessed that we have this resource. Sadly, here this is not the case and so I find that I have been teaching and providing teaching materials and notes yet the impact is not as expected.
And so as I was driving back from a village one day I began to think of trying to produce a Catechism in picture form geared at the African community. I am not an artist in anyway but by God’s grace I was connected with an artist in South Africa and together I believe that we have almost produced the first plate. “What is the Chief aim of man?” To glorify God in all he is and does. We have a long way to go and it seems quite an overwhelming task at times, but we need to look at it at one plate at a time. Please do pray for us as we continue in this project.
“ Your Word is a lamp to my feet and a light for my path.” Psalm 119:105
As mentioned in the previous post many folks struggle to read and comprehend the Scriptures. As we are all aware, as Christians, it is vitally important that we spend time in God’s Word everyday in order to grow and mature in the our walk with Him. For many of us from a literacy background that is not difficult in the sense that we can all read and comprehend. It is usually other excuses that we have that hinder us from this spiritual practise.
But to the oral person and culture the reading and comprehending is a major challenge. So we have come up with a solution to this. Most folks around us have small radios that take SD cards. They are a great bit of technology that keep the music going in the African Village. So by placing the Bemba New Testament onto these SD cards we have now been able to hand out about 20 of these cards with a great response. We glue the safe switch on the side so that the Bible can never be erased to be replaced by music. I have had many requests for more SD cards and recently received another 20 in the mail to copy. In the next month these will also be distributed. Please pray that as the Word of God goes out in audio it will impact people’s lives. Will keep you posted as to how things go.
“ … that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.”
Zambia, as I am sure many of you are aware are facing a small economic crises at present. Due to the low international copper prices we do not have a lot of cash to go around. Copper is Zambia’s main industry and employer. Even though the copper is mined only in a relatively small area of the country this situation effects every person and institution. We have a young friend who is very keen on becoming a teacher. He is an orphan, or vulnerable person, the term I prefer. We helped him through school and now would like to help him put himself through Teaching College. The fees are just to much for us to afford so we devised a little business opportunity.
Every Zambian eats “nshima” which is made from mielie meal or corn meal. So we decided earlier this year that I would take some of our savings and buy maize or corn in the village and then grind it and package it to raise funds for him. He has been helped by a church in the USA for one session but we feel that we just needed something more sustainable. So he spends is day grinding the maize in a mill and then we bag it and sell it.
But I felt why not use this opportunity for the Lord as well. So in each bag of 10Kg of mielie meal or corn meal we place a small exercise book and a Gospel tract. I would love to have used a picture tract as I early explained about the literacy aspect but we do not have any so we use what we have. Well it has been such a great success that we have run out of maize or corn. Unfortunately, we did not have enough capital to buy enough maize for a year when it was cheap, so once this batch is finished we will clean up and wait for next year’s buying season. We are hoping to buy about 1200 100Kg bags but that will cost in the region of US$ 10 000. But this will create something sustainable not only for this young man but for others that may follow him. Pray that we can buy this quantity. This year we have raised about US$ 1000 from the business. Pray that the Word goes out and lives are touched by the tract.
