With Annlin congregation in Mozambique (Mocuba and arround)

I arrived in Mocuba before them and could receive the team there. They are mostly from Annlin DRC congregation from Pretoria, but also some others who joined in.

We had a day of orientation that went very well and the attitude of the team became their great testimony. They decided to serve and learn while talking about christian practical issues. The team divided in two and I joined the one group going to Lugela. They played with the children, did skills with women braiding hair, sharing food and became really intimate. So much so that from both sides, greeting was with a bit of tears. With the leaders from the men women and youth, we talked about Stewardship. They shared with us a few stories through which God were experienced as real and part of their community. The story of Sara and here baby whose life's were saved not only by the previous intervention of the teams of South Africa but clearly because of the grace of God. The others story of a child with skin problems that were helped as well as the testimony of the team that were in the accident. They experienced this accident very emotionally up till today they share the loss with a lot of emotion. The big testimony is because the team did not stop to be involved in Mozambique, but is still visiting and still show love and service. These things opened the hearts of the community on a very special way. Every message is taken seriously. The translator also mentioned that it is the fist place where he see that the children did not take any of the coloring pencils or equipment for themselves. They brought back every pencil.

We applied stewardship on animals, nature, church and marriage. The discussions were very open and they were really exited to understand more of the way God intended life to be. God wants us to develop and wants the church to serve the community and bring truth and light to brokenness. God wants marriages to be honest, joyful, faithful and examples of how He loves the world. etc.

We went back to town for Sunday to wash clothes, church service in town and visiting the Bible school.

On Monday our group visited Mutucua, a new Prayer house in Maganja da Costa district. The road took us over a scary home made bridge deep into the bush. First we had to build relationships after the children fled at the sight of a white man approaching them. The work with youth changed the relationship totally. With the leaders we heard what make them happy and sad. Some of the challenges were the lack of funds for church premises and for building. With stewardship we focused on love as the basis of development. God's love for us reflected to other people. The understanding came that love, not power, humility not position, etc will bring people to the church. The pastor also asked us to talk about the understanding that there are a future. We asked: If we love the community and one another what will happen within a month. They guessed that there will be at least 2 more people in the church. What about 6 months, then a year, then 2 years and then 10 years. They believe that there will then be  many people in the prayer house. With so many people they will be able to buy the land and build the church? One of the consequences of love is development and that will happen with only the resources that God gave them. It depends on God and not on help from outside.

We again talked about marriages and some complained about lazy wives. At the end we agreed that to have a wife that will make you proud, we need to love and serve and that has a very good chance of developing your wife to be someone you are proud of. We also talked about faithfulness and other aspects of marriage relationships that are different than cultural thinking.

The Jesus film again was a hit.

The last day we spent at Magodane congregation. The program was delayed by rain. At the end our meetings there were accepted very well.

We went back to Mocuba and prepared for the next day to start our trip back. We had many experiences on the road, but it went very well. In Inhassoro we stayed for an extra day to talk about our vision for the future, our attitude in giving report to our congregations etc. It went well and we could sort out some practical things for the next outreach. We left there with some ideas to think about.

Bernadette drove down with me to Cape Town and it went well. We give her and her family in the hands of the Lord in the challenges facing them.

With Villiersdorp in Mozambique (Pemba)

The team were organized through the DRC church in VIlliersdorp, with members of other churches also involved. Some were families and we left with four cars.

Driving to Mozambique

On the first day 19th of June, we managed to reach Senekal in the Freestate. We were spoilt by the church people there. Then we continued east to enter Swaziland from the south. On our way we heard that the bridge over the Save river were closed because of political turmoil. So we decided to go through Zimbabwe. We took the road to the north and reached Loskopdam the evening where we camped. One of the team members left us there with a bad back pain. From there we reached the border where we encountered a few challenges. Firstly the Migration people wanted the birth certificates of the children and we did not have all of them. Firstly they did not want us to cross and that was very emotional. We pleaded and continued to explain and then they allowed them. Then we had to stand in the row for 5 hours to get customs clearing.

Pasted after hard work

After that one of the cars were registered on the farms name and they did not have the correct documents. They had to turn around go through all the red tape to get back to RSA. The rest of us continued till Lion and Elephant in Zimbabwe and reached there at midnight. We stayed over there and waited for the other car. At 12 they joined us with great joy. Then we continued and reached the mission station at Morgenster where we stayed from the night. From there it went well, but slow because of the situation of the road, until reaching Pemba. There the one car were fined for not having a chevron on the back. We did not want to pay a bribe and had to be escorted by the police through town to go and pay the fine. I believe that that was a good testimony, because bribes are the common thing. The police thought that these church people are very strange. I got Malaria and had it bad for a few days. Through the outreach I had to recover.

We reached our destination with Johan Dames and started the next day with building the little school and building relationships especially by playing with the children of this Muslim community. The foundation built for the schoo, was not level and we first had to level it and then I again learned a lot about building through the experts in the team. The team managed to build very good relationships and left a very positive image of christianity in the community. On top of that they did the floor with the walls and the pillars of the school by working hand in hand with the local community in a very positive way. From both sides we worked very hard and the community expressed their gratitude throughout the whole process.

We had nice seafood to eat

I left the team a few days early to join the team from Pretoria in Mocuba.

With Strand Congregation in Mozambique

Sunday School training outreach with Strand reformed Church

 

The first team was actually a very small team. In the last hours we heard that the material we wanted to use on the outreach did not arrive in Milange. Dirkie managed to get the material and we had to divide it between us for the flight to Malawi. We made the weight limit and me and Dirkie flew out to Malawi. Kobus and Nana met us on the airport and we stayed the first night with them. From there we hired the Prado from Milange and went drove to Mocuba with Benjamin, the leader of the youth group of the synod. We met up with another youth leader from Magodane congregation in Mocuba. The first day of training were postponed for a day because of communication problems. It was a group of maybe ten that came for the training and the two youth leaders who did the training, did very well. Me and Dirkie only helped with a few small things. I had to talk about our calling specifically for the youth. They used material for Sunday school and helped the local youth leaders to use it effectively as lessons for Sunday school. The focus is not on only understanding the messages of the Bible, but also to focus on the growth of a relationship with the Lord.

After the training we spent a few days in Mocuba visiting Lugela, Tacuane, Muraba and a new church near Muraba. We listened to trained youth leaders in giving the first lesson to the children and afterwards helped and encouraged them. Some of them surprised us with a lot of initiative and enthusiasm. Benjamin also brought the Jesus film and we showed it in all of these places.

I also had a good talk with the building committee that is responsible for the building of the church building in Mocuba. They are very inexperienced for a project like this, but in general did very well in managing the building. They build the walls up to window level. It is a good partnership where the local congregation is responsible for one part of the work and Strand congregation helps with the rest. It is a nice process that is not finishing a task but is developing people involved.

We also visited Magodane congregation where we also had a day of training whereafter we visited prayer houses to listen to the youth leaders in presenting their first classes. They were very excited and we can see that some of them will do good in creating a system of Sundayschool. Felizardo, the youth leader of Magodane did very well.

On our way back we went with a small bush road to the prayer house of Machina and the people there demonstrated a deep gratitude and enthusiasm. We really enjoyed it. The morning at 4 it started raining so we packed everything and left for Milange. The road was very wet, but we arrived in good time. On the way we shared with one another about the privilege of doing this work, because it also form our own lives in a powerful way.