3rd Trip To Malawi

In June Ike and I made a third trip to Malawi. I spent a few days in Blantyre doing prison visitation with a local pastor and then joined Ike in Lilongwe. Here is a summary of our work so far in Malawi.

Beginnings

I arrived in South Africa in September 2009 full of expectation. I had participated in an immigration center ministry for several years in the UK, which had really whet my appetite for working with Africans. Soon after my arrival I met Ike, who mentioned that they had received an invitation, via the local Family web site, to hold a Bible training seminar for rural pastors and elders. All they lacked was a vehicle to make the trip. I was in the process of buying a vehicle for my family and so I grabbed at the opportunity to offer the vehicle as long as I could join the trip!

Bible Seminars

This was the first of two weeklong seminars that were held over the next 6 months. Nearly 50 rural pastors and elders benefited from an intensive week of Bible training, memorization and inspiration! What a joy it is to pass on the word training and the spirit of what we have received in the Family to hungry receptive people! How wonderful to spend a whole week in the word preparing and giving classes!

Crusades

On the second trip we also held two crusades in the rural areas, planting churches in two new areas. We showed the Jesus movie in the evening; this was paused, as Jesus carried the cross, for a powerful salvation message. The following morning we held a follow-up outdoor event and two new churches resulted. On our third trip we were happy to hear the two churches were going strong!

Marquee Tent

The church we are working with, Gospel Harvest Church has 27 rural branches and is very keen to expand into the rural areas where there are no churches. However they still have no central church building and are renting a school classroom. They do have a plot of land in their name and are looking build a headquarters church. Of course they were keen to enlist our help! However, after a couple of months, Ike and I felt burdened that fundraising for a large church building was not really our calling! The Lord encouraged us to abide in our calling of teaching the word and trust Him that “Your heavenly Father knows you have need of these things.” Three days later I visited a church to pick up some shoes and discovered they had a large discarded marquee tent lying outside. They agreed to donate the tent to us for Malawi. Over a period of several months we made some repairs to the tent and provisioned what was missing. Ike called a man he was referred to who had a haulage company and this man offered to take the tent up for us for free and also offered Ike a vehicle for the next trip. This also meant we could fly up and not waste so many days driving. The tent is, as I write, on its way!

Into the Rural

On this third trip during we visited 10 rural churches, sometimes hiking up and down hills and across rivers to reach them. It was great! We also sourced and bought a computer for the leader of the church so he could begin work on translating an adapted Foundation Stones into Chichewa, the local language. We hope to print them down here in South Africa. We also brought a library of Family devotional books for the central church. If they can make the library work then we will try to provide more for the other branches.

Bible Seminar for 250 Pastors

Also on this third trip I, Simon diverted for a few days to Blantyre to answer another invitation from a pastor in that city, who is very active in prison ministry. We visited five prisons together and I taught in his church. He was very excited by the teaching and suggested a Bible training seminar for 250 pastors in his area. So many of them have never been to Bible school. We believe this is a wonderful open door that we hope to put into action next year.

Accept Invitations!

I feel one of the principle lessons is to accept invitations to teach the word. The Lord really wants us to share the spiritual wealth we have. Even if it seems impossible to accept, just do it. The Lord will make a way!

In 2010 we accepted an invitation to go to Kenya without knowing how it would work out. The Lord did it and supplied. Six months later my wife Natasha, Mike and Donna made a six-week faith trip all the way to rural Kenya. If we follow Him in order to feed His children, I believe He will take care of everything else!

Unfortunataly I have no pictures from the Blantyre leg of the trip so here are some from
Lilongwe.



This is the central church in Lilongwe still renting a classroom.

We donated a library of materials to the church. If the library works here then we can supply more for other areas. We also donated a whole lot of Gospels of John in Chichewa and English.

This is the plot where we are planning to errect the tent. The tent was delayed coming up but there was still a power line that still needed to be removed in order to put up the tent. We were therefore free to visit the rural churches during our visit.

We donated a computer to Maston in order to start translating material in to the local language.

Ike and I starting our trek to a rural church

We are going to cross this river and make it to a village on top of the hill on the other side

Fortunatley we made it across without a ducking!


Maston introducing us to the local people

Presenting the local pastor with Bibles and Gospels.


Inovation in the rural areas. Home made guitar and drum kit!

At another church in the rural area.

Preaching in a church in Kasungu

A wonderful rural church.

The principle of a rural school : she has 146 kids in her class!

News and School Programs

Its been such a long time since I have talked about the work here. It has been continuing on several fronts rather quietly in the first few months of the year.

1) We have been working on repairing and sourcing parts for the 900 sq metre marquee tent that was donated to us for the work in Malawi. This has been a little bit of a headache for me as I felt quite responsible to ensure that this thing will be safe and secure when it arrives in Malawi.

Everything has worked out well so I am very grateful that for small cost we have been able to repair all the canvas , replace half the rachets, source 50 7.5 kilo tent pegs, and repair the cabling that is needed to ultimatley secure the tent.

This is now very nearly done and should be shipped up to Malawi in the next month.

Repairing the canvas: one of three massive pieces of canvas. Thank God for the space!

2) Along side the marquee I've also been working on the some Bible classes that can be translated and printed in local languages in Malawi and other countries. This has been alot of work and quite laborious!

3) I am so thrilled with our work in the High Schools. We now have a regular weekly student Christian meeting in three Diepsloot High Schools. This has just been so rewarding. We know that many of these teenagers are facing a geat deal of pressure bnoth at home and school. We have had a great response. At the end of every meeting we ask the students for their written prayer reqests and we have been getting such a big insight into their lives and the pressures they face.

Girls from Paradise Bend School.

Volunteers, Christiaan, Tina and Phoebe with teenagers from Diepsloot Combined School.

Young people from Paradise Bend School.

We have now been given permission to bring our camper truck into the school to open a mobile Christian library and counseling center so that we can be at the school for the whole of the day.

Finally here are some pictures!

We were so happy to have a visit from our son Sam in February. he has grown up alot and having just passed his driving was quite disparaging about my driving!

He is living in Paris and doing a full time French course which he says he is picking up quickly. Having only learnt, "Bonjour", in three years at school , this is really quite amazing. Having a French girlfriend seems to be quite the incentive!

Gem loved having her big brother around!

Ahh so nice when he's all grown up!!!!

Here are some pictures of our recent holiday in Durban.
Natasha by the beach which was a two minute walk from our campsite/hotel.

Three kids in tents and Mum, dad and Gem in the camper. So everybody had their own space and could do their own thing!

Amanda chilling by the pool!

Suki and Gem watching something in the camper.

Gem successfully learnt to ride a bike on holiday.

It was great as training wheels were left at home and she just took off the first time without the usual bumps and scratches. She did great!

The Moods of Gem! Never too long before a smile!





Shawn and Amanda about to be wiped out by a humungous wave

Shawn leads the withdrawal from the battering waves!

Amanda and Suki loving it!

Sun and sand !

Shawn !

School Program

We had so much fun practicing our new play "Who is the master?" We ended up using it in two school programs and really enjoyed ourselves. Our team of young people was up to 15 for these programs and we are looking to do more in the New Year.
Checkout the original play on http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XD9G2UHTttg.
Both Shawn and Amanda participated.

Amanda and Ellie make up the tree in the garden of Eden

Adam and Eve sample the fruit


After the fruit prisoners to Satan (Shawn)

As Jesus dies on the cross bearing the sins of many, Satan thinks he is victorious.

Just when you thought Jesus was defeated and Satan victorious, the tables are turned by the resurrection!

The young person (Tony) at the beginning of the Set Me Free play.

Applause at the end of Set me free.

Pakistan Conclusions--- (7th Post)

Well I wanted to try and put the visits to Pakistan in perspective to show how they have worked and advanced the work there so here is a little summary.

1st Visit 2008 Summer

We primarily visited the prisons, adult education program and held a five day Bible Conference for 60 people.

We saw Yaqoob's work first-hand and got to know him well for the first time.

2nd Visit 2009 Spring

We spent more time in Green Town and saw the need for translating and printing literature. After that visit money was raised for the printing of 1000 Urdu Foundation Stones late 2009 and in 2010 we printed 1500 Obstacles Are For Overcoming Books and 3000 tracts. Without the visit it is unlikely these initiatives would have been taken.

3rd Visit Autumn 2010

Once again the Lord opened the door for us to spend considerable time in Green Town (8 consecutive days). Yaqoob has focussed on prison outreach, church and adult education previously but after this visit much more emphasis will be placed on local outreach, challenging young people to be sowers of Gods word and leading people to the Lord in the highways and byways of Lahore . Also by making contact with other churches in the area we hope to build a more united church front with churches ministries complementing each other and working together for a common cause.

All in all we feel the work is building up nicely as well as being lots of fun!

Many Many Friends (6th Post)

Due to spending so much time in Green Town, some very strong friendships were forged during our times of prayer and reading Gods word.

First of all with Yaqoob. His wife being away with their children, I was able to stay in his apartment so we plenty of time for talking and discussion which, on previous visits we had had to try to schedule in. He looked after me so very well. In three visits I have not had a single upset tummy! He is extremely faithful and, as we would say in the Uk, "a very safe pair of hands."


Sikandah was a nother young pastor who joined us for just about every session. He invited me to baptise some people at his church. Yaqoob eventually said it was probably better I didn't due to my situation as a foreigner visiting, but I think in retrospect I should have really! Next time..! A true friend and hard worker in Gods Kingdom.


Gulshan is the wife of a "out of work"pastor who lives in the Green Town area. She attended every day of the Bible conference, the Youth meeting, the Sunday service and three sessions of Bible studies in the second week. She really was a truly lovely lady with a beautiful meek and quiet spirit; an excellent mentor for the younger girls. She and her husband will be joining Yaqoob for prison ministry and outreach.


Shazzard and Shakila are two recently married young people from Green town who Yaqoob is considering having as full time staff. They can be supported for up to as little as £45.00 a month. She is a trained architect and he is an excellent worship leader. God willing they will support Yaqoob in the work in Green Town and beyond. he has already been a faithful prison visitor.


Six sisters who attended the Bible conference and Youth Meeting. very precious especially the eldest Shammiah second from left. One evening I had closed with song St Francis's Prayer "Lord make me an instrument of your peace."


At the end of the service she insisted I play it again so she could record it on her mobile phone. Then she came the next night having learned it all and offered to sing it with me! (By the way it is not Pakistani custom to smile in a photograph!)


This lady really helped Yaqoob with the layout and printing of our books. She now has set up a little computer training centre in Green Town...the first of its kind! We hope to put some of the leading members of the church through the course.


Yaqoob's nephew and niece, Shazzar and Umrah. I spent a lovely couple of hours with them in Multan. They were just so sweet and she is a great fan of Joyce Meyer which was quite interesting. I showed them pictures of South Africa from the blog and ...it was just fun!


The three sisters! Hanna , Fozzia and Mary. They all attended every session. Keen to join outreach and prison teams and flood relief team. The latter in unlikely as in this conservative society their father would not permit them to spend a night away from home.


Yaqoobs brother (centre) heads up the Campus Crusade Operation in Multan. We visited on our way to flood relief and I was invited to speak at a small gathering of their staff.


Yaqoob's brother-in-law is the headmaster of primary school. We stayed the night with him prior to flood relief and he also asked me to adress the school. I told the story of Samuel hearing Gods voice in the night and advised them to listen to God, their parents and teachers and their brothers and sisters..(in that order oreferably!)


A lovely Christian family near the flood area. They live in the large compound of a huge power station. Lovely housing, and facilities..school, clinic, gym ..all flooded but already restored. They were very hospitable and we held a little service in their living room before going to flood relief. And I got to ride around the compound with their children before lunch!

Final words: I have a second home. Wonderful sweet receptive people.