Dieu fidèle—Faithful God

Congolese wedding receptions seem interesting.  I hear a lot of singing (currently the French version of “I Could Sing of Your Love Forever”), loud music blaring, dancing, cheering, and plenty of the traditional Congolese cries of joy coming from the chapel in the Bible school right across the path from our house.

Pasteur Ezekiel's church.  This is where we'll
be going in the morning.

They also make good excuses to write blog posts because all of this is happening at 11:30 at night and it looks like I won’t be going to sleep any time soon.

If you asked me before I left what I would be doing over here ministry-wise, I may have told you that I was thinking about starting some sort of radio ministry.  More about that.  About two weeks into my first semester at SAGU last fall, I was praying.  After I got up, I received a strong, distinct thought from God:  “Create a ministry.”  Hm.  “Well,” I thought, “I’m a freshman here, and I’m leaving in 4 months (then I was planning to come to Congo January 2014) … what could I possibly start that would last and be good?”  Trying to be obedient to the crazy notion anyway, I looked for opportunities to start something on campus.  Nothing turned up. 

Swahili homework, African style.  Note smashed mosquito.

Somehow I got the idea that maybe I was to start something in Congo and I should start thinking about it now.  I looked up some potential needs in Congo and saw that there were a high percentage of Christians—statistics range to around 80-90%--yet sound teaching was rare and mixing non-biblical cultural practices in with the faith was too common.  What could transmit true, biblical teaching for many Christians to hear and be brought to a fuller understanding of how they should live to please the Lord?  Radio ministry came to mind.  I typed in something like “congo radio ministry” into Google to get more information, and the very first site that popped up was perfect.  It had information about Congolese history, a ton of statistics about radio and TV in Congo, and regulations on media.  I definitely took it as confirmation, and did so even more after I received a wave of fear, anxiety, and “oh you can’t do that,” which probably came straight from the enemy, right after reading the site.  So I decided to do it.

Bill and Pasteur Ezekiel preaching/translating
at a village on the Kolwesi trip.  The two have
a good relationship.

I thought I would write one of my ministry focus papers on creating such a radio ministry in Congo to make some preparatory plans, but during my research I found that a lot of local people said that outside-sponsored media enhancement projects that didn’t incorporate the advice of the local people ended up being entirely irrelevant.  Realizing whatever plans I made by myself at home would probably be obsolete there, I decided to wait and ask God to raise up someone here with the same idea for this ministry whom I can partner and plan with to make this work.

Recently I found out that the very pastor we’re working with in Lubumbashi, Pasteur Ezekiel, has been thinking about starting a TV station to meet the exact same need.  There’s already 12 church-sponsored TV shows, but all that all of them do is preach.  No creative, relative teaching whatsoever.  It’s been nearly 9 months since I first prayed that prayer and the Lord gave me that vision, He has guided it since then, and now He is bringing it to pass.  The Lord is ever so good and faithful!!

So there’s a cool testimony to what God can do though one prayer.  Many more will follow through your prayers for this ministry!

Me and Pichene in ESL class.
If you notice my nametag, I kinda changed
my name to Zacharie.  It's easier for them to say here.

What else has been going on?  I started Swahili lessons a while back.  Those are going well and I’m able to say a good number of relevant sentences.  Wanaimba kule.  Sipenda maana naitajiya kulala.  (They’re singing over there.  I don’t like that because I want to go to sleep.)  My French is improving incredibly as well.  I’m thankful for the Lord’s help in that.  Sonia started up an English as a Second Language class at Pasteur Ezekiel's church a few weeks ago.  

 Last weekend we went on a trip to a city about 4 hours northwest of here called Kolwesi to see and help out with a brother’s relief project.  That was definitely a cultural experience worthy of its own blog post, so next time.  Making friends is still taking a while.  There’s a lot of people who are outwardly friendly and I think I have yet to establish an equal, trusting relationship where all of my American white dude influence has been ironed out by equality and trust. 

Final thought.  I’ve tried to live a missionary lifestyle at home, and I was passionate about serving Christ and expanding His kingdom and seeing people hear the good news that there is a way to eternal life, there is a place of peace and love and rest and, and persuading others to be reconciled from a life of darkness and sin to the righteousness of Christ.  And now here I am in Africa, “missionaire apprentice,” living the call to go to be Christ’s witnesses to the ends of the earth, and yet… I keep asking myself these questions… Do I really want to see God’s name be glorified?  Am I concerned about His kingdom coming?  Do I really care about His Name, this Name above all Names, the Name of my Heavenly Father, being kept holy?  Is following Jesus and seeking to please Him the primary motivation in my life?  Am I really groaning for His soon-coming return and am ready to see Him come? 

The answers to these questions within me, these very motivations to the missionary calling, are a lot more barren than I once perceived them to be.  This is when the Holy Spirit is working in me what is pleasing to the Father and the heated shock of cross-cultural living are really bringing the worst in me to the surface.  This is the time where the Lord is forming my motivation not just towards the fulfillment of a call, but for the very longing of my soul to be clothed with the fullness of eternal life in Christ.  This… well… this is quite the making of a missionary.

Next time:  Visiting villages on the trip to Kolwesi.

Things are looking up

It’s been two weeks since I got here.  On average, most short-term trippers would be on the flight home now.  I am still here for the next 10 months, and I haven’t even almost barely begun to understand how to relate to people here.  But things are looking up.

Talking with a few "jeunes" (young people)
in the quartier... with my perpetual confused face

I’ve realized a few things about African relationships.  Story time.  The first time I went to the duck duck goose quartier, I had the opportunity to talk to a couple young fellows, Jean-Luc and Gabi.  During the conversation, Jean-Luc showed me this paper filled with Scriptures and declarations about the blood of Jesus, printed all in English.  I thought he was asking me to translate his paper into French.  I agreed, thinking it would be a good friendship favor, but later I suspected that he just duped me into doing his homework.  I translated only the declarations, thinking that he could translate the verses on his own with his French Bible, but upon taking it back to him and telling him that, he had a new request for me.  He didn’t have a French-English Bible, but he wanted one.  I didn’t have one either so I said I would talk to someone about getting one.  A few days later they showed up at the gate to the house asking me if I could teach an English class for them.  See where this is going?    

I thought the same thing too, that they just wanted things from me.  Not that I was opposed to that, since they were asking for uhh Bibles, but relationships in my perspective are hard to form when nearly the first to the last sentence of a conversation deals entirely with the latest request. 

But I talked to the missionary who knows these kids and runs the school they go to about the whole thing, and she gave me a different perspective.  Apparently they fell away from church and slipped into witchcraft and worldly living, but now it looked like God was bringing them back.  That’s why she gave them the Scriptures about the blood of Jesus, and that’s why they wanted the French-English Bibles.  She said that Gabi wanted to get the whole quartier saved, and they were hungry for more teaching and discipleship.  Both of them agreed to work to earn money to buy the Bibles.  So…they’re not just some kids trying to jip me into doing their homework or getting them free stuff.  They are honestly spiritually hungry. 

People are not always as they appear to me here.  I need discernment and patience to be able to figure out relationships and who people really are.

Inside Pasteur Ezekiel's church.
There were about 60 adults and 80 children that came.

Ministry plans here are starting to spirit out.  Because we’re not living according to the flesh.  Haha lame Jesus juke.  Ok so I love talking with young people—les universitaires, university students my age.  At the prayer meeting last Friday, a new fellow joined the church.  He transferred from the larger parent church of the church plant.  Back there, he worked with the evangelism/get-people-to-come-to-church department, and I’ll be serving with him in talking to, visiting, and praying for people while inviting them to come to our church.  I would love to do that. 

Oh and about that… a couple days ago, Hannah and I went around the neighborhood with Pasteur Ezekiel’s wife, Maman Mimi, to hand out church invitations to people.  She kept saying “Si un blanch le leur donne, ils viennent.” If a white person gives them a flyer, they’ll come.

Hm.  I was not quite sure what to think of that.  It made me a bit uncomfortable.  After talking with Bill a bit, I realized this…  Here, people highly regard all things Western.  If it’s American, it’s better.  That, and they associate white skin with wealth, because most white folk who pass through are wealthy.  When white people attend a church, it gives the church credibility.  That’s kinda why the church we went to this Sunday often had the camera on us for their TV broadcasting.  So, then I will use this white skin—wisely—as a tool to draw others in.  Does that make you feel like that’s not right?  A lot of me does too.  But we’ll see how this goes.

That calls for another corollary lesson on missions:  keep the long-term goal in mind in the midst of temporary ministry.  After 10 months, white man will be gone and so will the attraction that comes with me.  Whatever draw I could offer myself is only temporary.  That’s not a bad thing, and it’s certainly not so if people see that credibility, come to church, and are made into disciples because of that.  But I need to offer more than just my skin color in order to help establish a long-lasting, effective evangelism/people-reacher department whose ultimate draw is the love, fellowship, acceptance, grace, and provision of Christ, not just a white man.  The relationships I will establish with my Congolese friends in this ministry are essential to completing this.  This is what I am so looking forward to!!

Here's another great ministry possibility.
Students come from all across town to study
on the peaceful, beautiful compound.
Maybe something can come out of this.

The girls got to sing at a prison a couple times.

All in all, relating to people cross-culturally is tough.  I have found that is easy to concede to fleshly tendencies and frustrations on the field and let new changes in character and behavior get out of hand.  But I have learned one powerful weapon against conforming to the flesh and towards living by the will and Spirit of God--prayer.  However, prayer is not what strengthens us and gives Christ-like character and directs our path—our Heavenly Father does that, and He can be related to in prayer.  It is only through Jesus, who has cleansed me of my sin and put me in perfect standing before God, through whom I can relate to the Father.  And it is only through living the example of Jesus, which can only be forged by God in prayer, that I can relate to these people in love.

Did I mention this would be the making of a missionary?