Loving the Least and the Lost

Yesterday as we drove to our property, as we passed thru the first village we heard the children shouting after us like they always do. But this time they were shouting something different, “Peter, Peter, Peter!!”

The Mandate team (of which Peter was a part) has left after six weeks of being with us. Let me brag on them a bit. This was a very young team in age, but mature in the faith. It may have been the first time some of them cast out demons (see following par.), but I think most of them learned they had much bigger spiritual guns than they knew. Many of them felt uncomfortable sharing the gospel, but most of them found it easy to love people in a way that turned their hearts toward Jesus. And they did - Robeson, after some of the guys spent a night at his house and ate with his family, said something like, “I now know that God loves me, because he sent these people to me.” Now Robeson is a faithful participant in our English and Bible class, and next week will come with us for a week of training on Farming God’s Way in Zimbabwe.

Nomokow knows God loves her too. Nomokow’s grandmother was a witch doctor, who supposedly killed her own daughter (Nomokow’s mother) with witchcraft. Then not long ago Nomokow had a dream  that she would be killed by the same witchcraft. Not long after she started getting the same symptoms - paralysis. After prayers from her church leaders (a syncretistic church - the appearance of godlessness with the predictable powerlessness) she was able to move a little, but still had pain and soon became mute as well. This went on for a week or more. So the people turned to those who are emissaries of the only True and Living God. Kingdoms struggled and young students were forced to imitate boldly what they had only seen in Bible print. Eventually with much choking and coughing the demons left and she began to talk again and her pain was gone. This was the power encounter we had been praying for.

Now there are three small D-groups studying the Bible together. We had hoped the team would have also started some kids cluster clubs, but we will do that soon.

Peter and Nessa and Georgina were amazing - they just wanted to live in there full time, so when the others came back to our home for the weekend, they stayed and lived in the village homes, ate their food, bathed where they did, and even drank the river water! Yuck! Jason was a work horse - clearing brush, fixing the shelter, building cool benches and shelves, and building a mud storage shed for us. Natalie and CeCe were constantly playing with the kids and telling them Bible stories. I hear CeCe went off one day by herself and started a bible study in the next village! We are following up on that. Lynn was fearless - finding people and just digging into their lives, making friends and always bringing in her love for Jesus. Liana is so natural among the poor - people know they are loved and embraced with compassion.

A word for each of them:

• Peter is King (Narnia) - but fortunately does not know it yet. But watch out world!
• Cece - a beach ball of joy. It is your ministry, your gift to the body.
• Natalie - a small wedding ring box - not yet opened to reveal the glory inside. Don’t listen to the ancient words that keep you shut. You are a diamond!
• Georgina - a wild fire - passionate intercession. Nuf said.
• Lynn - anteater - not a social butterfly - intensely interested in one thing - digging in for the real thing.
• Nessa - Amy Carmichael - single minded devotion to Jesus, listening only to Him, content with nothing less, yet tender of heart - dying 2 self 2 live 4 Him.
• Kirsty - a perfect reflection of her mother - a grand compliment. Servant of all, friend of all, content in all circumstances.
• Jason - David Livingstone - able to go it alone, indomitable persistence, industrious with every thought - will accomplish what others just dream of.
• Liana - ahh, what can I say? A perfect blend of mom and dad - too humble for her own good (mom), and willing to lead a team thru death swamps without flinching (dad). Passion for Jesus is the dominant trait.

Thanks each of you for your contribution to our lives and those in Singanga. They are all asking when you will return (as am I).  Old man Robert said to me yesterday, “That tall one (with tone ascending indicating the extent of the tallness - meaning Jason), I tell him he must come and live here and take care of the madalla (old one = me!).”

I agree.

Notes:

• Though in the middle of rainy season it rained seldom when the team was here. But it has rained almost every day since the team left, starting almost the hour of their departure.
• We were able to make our quarterly property pmt ($6,700) yesterday. Thanks to all of you who are listening to Jesus and partnering with us.
• I am learning to farm - have about 9 mango trees, 2 avocado, 2 guava, 2 papaya, 30 other trees, and 9 Maringa (miracle plant) ready to plant on the property. Planting tomatoes and peppers this week.
• Our chicken business is growing - our 100 chickens are 2 weeks from ready to sell. Pray for buyers.
• The chief finally signed off on the land purchase. Now only a few documents to finalize it all.
• Regina’s English class has about 30 students. This week taught how to write their name properly - took about 30 min for that lesson!
• I have told the second Bible story - the Rebellion: Lucifers, then Adam and Eves. Acting it out and discussion afterwards. Much interest with the same 30 as Regina’s class.
• Next week take headman and Robeson to Zimbabwe for a week training for African farming.
• Then when we return the Davis’s, a newly married couple from Grand Rapids, join us for a month or so.      

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Re 21:19  The foundation stones of the city wall were adorned with every kind of precious stone.

We hear there are emeralds out west - that it is an area “like the wild west” - lawless, wild - a little girl standing on a heap of emeralds selling them for $10 each. Others will kill and be killed for them. They say politicians have their fingers in the honey pot, licking off any potential benefit the country might have from such a wonderful natural resource. The face of Africa is pocked with pussing sores where these gifts of God have been discovered, leaving infectious craters where demons flock. Most of Africa’s demonically inspired atrocities - and there are many - have their beginnings in such pits of “my precious” (say it like Gullim) worth killing for.

 Wake up Africa! Shake the deceptive dust from your eyes. The precious stone is not what is being sold for $10, but it is the little feet that are standing on the pile - the little hands held out to the stranger - the little matted head with hunger and soul-neglect showing thru her eyes. The world, in it’s blindness, has valued what God has rejected, and rejected what God has placed as the finest diamonds in his treasury. If more diamonds were found in Zambia would we have a better economy? A better education? Less hunger and prostitution? Would gold transform this nation? No. The opposite I am afraid.

But think of the other possibility. Orphans are a dime a dozen. In a school I visited last week of 1100 students, 450 orphans. In a dozen soccer kicking boys, the relatives pointed out to me 4 orphans. UNICEF states that that 38% of Zambian children are orphans - the highest country rate in the world - and 1 in 7 households in Zambia are led by an orphan no older than 14.

Think of the possibility - starting hundreds of Jesus Communities - little clusters of orphan homes, headed by a Jesus filled mom and dad who will love and raise these ones in the power of God, not dependent on resources of the west other than the start up of the home and garden and business that will support them and even take them thru college. Think of the potential of thousands of kids being immersed in Kingdom - their lives truly radically transformed - the Zambian culture that reflects heaven, amplified - the culture that originates in hell, purged with blood and fire. These will be true Zambians. Future presidents. Then there will be a future for Africa.

Agrippa and Janette Phiri are raising such gems at Kwathu Children’s Home. We have seen the transformation of these 9 little ones - many with heartbreaking stories of abuse and poverty - but in the eight months we have known them they are like different children - happy and obedient, attentive and helpful.  Global Outreach has a base where they have been mining such gems - 54 of them now - for years - just about to send their first batch to college! Rob Murphy is volunteering at a ministry that has been preaching the gospel in Zambia for 100 years - but just in the last 5 years they have started this baby house that takes vulnerable and orphaned children from impoverished village homes where they would have little hope of survival, and raise them for a few years, then transplant them back into their home soil, if possible, once hearty.

I am eager to get started on our first orphan home. I am envisioning simple African style homes for 8-10 children (12-1400SF), cement floor and mud walls, with basic indoor plumbing and outdoor cooking. Cheap, simple, filled with the Love and Life of Jesus. Three to five in a cluster, forming a Jesus Community that is a center in that community - from which the gospel will be planted in many hearts.  Then in the next community another three.

‘Will we find the children to fill them?” I asked at an orphan care giver.  ”Without a doubt! What we are doing is just a drop in the ocean of need. As soon as there is a bed available, it will be filled.” Can you imagine the destiny laying in that bed? Can you imagine the worth of that child that Jesus bought with his own blood? Can you imagine hundreds of such gems taking the Sword and the Cross thru Africa and into the world?

Let’s build.

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Pray for us as we contend with the spirits of greed, drunken-ness, jealousy, and all forms of selfishness. We are trying to work on behalf of the orphans and vulnerable children in Maloni Village who cannot afford to go to school. The village leaders are discussing our interest in starting some kind of simple business to provide a continual fund for these least of all.

It can work. I just visited Makuni Village where some friends started a garden 2 years ago with the same idea in mind. It is still going and helping tremendously. The school has 1100 kids and 450 of them are orphans!

I have found one wonderful couple in that village who would not steal from such a fund - but most of the leaders we know are corrupt and untrustworthy. This has so far thwarted every effort to help.

I am praying that God will contend for his children here - tear down the strongholds of the enemy and establish righteousness in this village.

Will you pray with me?

And another thought on the well for Justin issue from last blog - rather than paying $10,000 to drill a well, maybe someone can just buy a hand held well driller for about $1000, bring it on the plane, and drill the well themself! That would be a lot cheaper and give someone such a blessing. Then it could be used over and over again. Think about it…

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Hi, what’s your name?

Thomas - Adi - Victoria - Edward - countless other young people I meet and talk to

What grade are you?

10 - 6 - 11 - 7…

Are you going to school?

Eyes drop, feet shuffle, how does one explain? It is embarassing to admit - but school has passed them by. And with it the hope and possiblity of clawing out of the sinking bog of poverty.

Why?

Ahh - this is the common reply - said with a descending note at the end - not like “Ahh(with an ascending tone), I found something new and exciting!”, but like, “Ahh - that is about all that needs to be said - the obstacles mount up like an insurmountable wall - where does one start to explain? It is like the final breath that empties ones lungs at death - a final resignation to the inevitable.

That is what life is like for a child in Ngwenya Village - it is full of Ahh’s.  Questions like, “Do you have enough food?” or “Where is your father?” - usually get answered in the same way. 

We spent another weekend with them - Mandate mission team (www.mandateschools.com) doing a kids camp with them. I am drawn to them. (Remember, we spent Christmas day with them at our house?) These 80 kids who are full of contridictions in life - sometimes they pray like angels, and other times flirting for a nickle for sex. God, how can we reach them? How can we help empower them and lift them up from their destitute poverty? 

We want to bless Justin - the man who has been helping them for 5 years - with songs and prayers and bible verses. He can’t do anything about their school fees or hunger or family problems. He wants a well - $10,000 - to make gardens and chicken and goat farms for the kids. I tell him I will pray with him. Will you?

If you want to believe with me for the money to buy this well - or if you want to donate to it - write me at lovesdoor@gmail.com or send money with a note “To Justin’s Well” - to Love’s Door, c/o Open Door Church, 339 NW Sherman St, Sheridan, OR. 97378. Thanks.

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It’s cool to talk about going to the unreached, but man, it’s hard.

As we debriefed the team that had just spent four days camping on the land, we noticed the air was half let out of their balloons.

Just a few days ago Floyd McClung had taught them about going into the villages, sharing the gospel, connecting with people, finding a few to disciple, gathering them into small D groups, then teaching them to multiply. Our balloons were tight and ready to pop -a simple methodology, along with reignited faith in God’s passion and commitment to reach the lost had stirred us all to determination.

But in the village, with language barriers, cultural befuddlement like a ball of knotted twine, along with the hard work, the heat, the constant demand of children tugging at your hem - I sensed they were tired. Then one of them innocently got to the core - “I 

just wish we could stay in town more and minister to the people on the street.”

Ahh… That’s the truth. It is hard work going one step beyond your cultural group; try two or three steps, and we need a real good reason to be there!

Missiologists define it like this :

• E1 evangelism = reaching your own culture. This is the easiest and best.
• E2 evangelism = reaching a different, but similar culture - for me that would be Europeans, Mexicans, youth, Afro-Americans or South Africans.. Some language study may be needed, and the message put in their cultural context.
• E3 evangelism = reaching a culture that is distant and very different. One or more languages need to be learned, cultural understanding is imperative, come as a blind man, ready to be led by them.

You may ask - why even do E3 evangelism? Here is an amazing answer that may take a moment to reflect on the implications of:

If all the members of every church in the world were to bring every one of their friends and relatives within the same cultural group to obedient faith in Christ, and they in turn were able to bring all their friends and relatives to Christ and so on, no matter how much time you allow, there would still be billions who would never hear about Jesus! 

It’s cool to talk about going to the unreached - but man, it’s hard to do. You must be motivated, not for the coolness of it all, but out of love for Jesus - that his sacrificial death would not be in vain, but would accomplish its purpose - “you were slain, and purchased for God, with your blood, men from every tribe and tongue and people and nation.” 

Singanga Village, which surrounds our land, is made up of Lozi people. But they are situated in a Tonga-leah chiefdom. Many of these people say they are Christians - there is large New Apostolic church building between several villages. But do they know Christ? It is doubtful if there are any who actually know Christ. Is there a witness for Jesus, a single church somewhere in their tribe of villages that will shine the light and win the whole?

I love Joshua Project website - www.joshuaproject.net . According to their research the Tonga-leya’s main religion is ancestor worship, while 30% claim Christianity as their religion. But there are few if any known evangelicals - less than 2% - and no known church planting in recent years, though some evangelical resources in their language. This gives them a fairly high rating of importance according to their logic.

Unreached? No. Unengaged? Not while we are here. But we may be the only ones! Do they have a church yet? No one knows. But hopefully soon.

But how do you convert a person who says he wants to trust in Jesus, but when his wife gets sick he wonders who put a curse on her, or when no rain comes on his crop he goes to the witch doctor to find how to appease the spirits, or when you ask him to do anything different than customary he is fearful of offending his ancestors?

Outwardly he will agree with you and say your prayers, but deep down he is unchanged. If the gospel does not change his culture, the man remains unchanged. And how do you help affect such a change? Sermons won’t do it. Development won’t do it. Worship doesn’t do it - they can all put us to shame with their worship and prayer.

Will Africa ever have a move of God where masses are convicted and converted? Does their cultural baggage preclude them from radical conversion?

Africa is like Europe in the dark ages - they need their own Enlightenment or Reformation. Can you imagine what might be unleashed in the world if Africa went thru such an awakening? They are untouched by Western Humanism and Unbelief. Is it possible that an Awakened Africa could be in the front of Kingdom Movements in the Final Age?

Until then… we do our best.

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Psalm 85:9ff spoke to me this morning - “Surely His salvation is near to those who fear Him, that glory may dwell in our land!… Truth springs from the earth, and righteousness looks down from heaven. Indeed the Lord will give what is good, and our land will yield its produce. Righteousness will go before Him and will make His footsteps into a way.”

God’s glory, his salvation, his truth and righteousness blooming all over our land in the villages of Southern Zambia is our aim. Where God comes He WILL make an impact - guaranteed! And we are intentionally focused on “making His footsteps into a way”. We see how Jesus walked - those solo foot prints across virgin sand. He loved like no one ever! He discipled a few. He touched the poor. His methods and concepts broke the norms and opened new vistas. These are his footprints. Then we try with large strides to step in the same prints as He - now it may be called a path; then we teach others to walk in the same path - it is becoming a road; hoping they in turn will teach others who will teach others, who will… - it will become a highway! His Ways - starting in our own little community, radiating through our lives and witness, will conquer poverty mentality, animistic and dead religious concepts, and hopelessness. COME GLORY OF GOD!

Our aim is to make the Ways of Jesus into simple, teachable and re-teachable principles and patterns so they can grow from a footprint to a highway in this land where the glory and salvation of the Lord are destined to dwell. It will only dwell in power where it is communicated from person to person in homes and gardens and schools - a grass-roots movement of desire for truth.

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We have been in Zambia for 40 days now. God has been so extremely good to us. One missionary said, “I have never seen a missionary move here and get so much done in 30 days!” I think it is the blessing of Jesus on us - “He who is generous will be blessed, for he gives some of his food to the poor.”

The Mandate team arrived a week ago (led by our kids Liana and Jason) and we are having “a gas”, as I say (much to my daughter’s dismay).

(A word about Mandate Schools (www.mandateschools.com) - this is an amazing school, and one of the best kept secrets around! For the paltry cost of $2400 for about 6 months of room, board, paradigm shifting Bible teaching, weekly travel adventures, besides at least two or three outside the country, community life that kills (the flesh), and food that makes alive (the forgotten dreams of a slim waistline), lifelong friendships, life-changing encounters with the Living God - it is really unequalled. Well, I am a bit biased I suppose. But if you want to see one of the coolest sites on the web, click above, and while you are there, just fill in that application and get your life messed up forever. Parents, you can sign up your kids - we have bars and locks on the doors.)

We all packed up into the truck - 16 in all, along with loads of equipment (we can now sympathize with sardines), driving those wonderfully unforgettable roads, and camped at the property - the first time whites probably ever camped there!  We christened The Land with our prayers and songs, we took rides with the village fishermen in their dugout canoes, we played tug of war with the 30 or more children who swarmed us, and we laughed at the torrential downpours from the heavens. Our two main tasks this outing were to mark the property lines (we just had points before - this tree and that bush…), and locate where we will build a round-hovel for a storage shed. We are buying a dugout canoe so we can inspect the hippo a bit closer and explore the river.

Floyd McClung was here for 3 days teaching the team the basics of evangelism and simple church planting in Africa (basic CPX material - see www.all-nations.info ) - Mandate may be a feeder school if we don’t watch out!

After looking at about 15 rental houses in Livingstone, we found the perfect one. Our budget was $350/month, but we settled on this place for $400. We eve

n have a hot water heater! (though it does not push hot water thru the shower hose unless you are laying down in the tub!)

For Christmas someone (I confess ~) invited 40 orphaned kids and a dozen teen workers to party at our (not fixed up yet) house (I am still in hot water for that one!) We had a great time of food and games and Bible lessons and song.. Some of these kids have never been into town before, so it was quite a treat. THIS is why we are here - to build into these children a different Kingdom Culture that will set them on a better path.

We are planning on helping this team of workers start a business that will keep these Ngwenya orphans and vulnerable children in school fees and uniforms. We have had about $250 donated for them, but find it will cost three times that to get it started. (Any donors want to add to this seed amount? DONATE BUTTON)

Speaking of business ventures - we are about to start a chicken business that will help Africans join our ministry and still be able to contribute some for their expenses, as well as learn business principles. Hopefully we can get village partners in this business as well.

PRAYER NEEDS:

• Grace and protection for the Mandate team who are camping on the land in the village.
• Thanks for the house that is perfect for my wife!
• My wife is turning 39 for the 17^th time tomorrow - blessings on her. It has not been the easiest transition to make.
• Thanks to Jesus - I had secretly been praying for a video projector for evangelism in the villages - but told no one. Jeff - a friend - just came from Phoenix to visit, and brought one with! Jesus does hear and answer when no one else knows!
• Ask God to provide all our needs - He knows what that means.
• Ask God to send servants to help and wisdom to know how to share the load - we are already getting tired and have done so little of our objectives.
• Blessing on our marriage - my goal is to improve it significantly this year.

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Reading a book about Livingstone - an awesome believer who was passionate about sharing the Gospel wherever he went.

And he went- right around Livingstone here. This was sort of home base for part of his time. I bet he spoke Nyanja - now I wanna learn.

but I had a day like one of his (not nearly so grand) yesterday - Went to the village to get grass for the roof of the shelter I am having built for the Mandate team to camp under. The headman found a place to buy grass “nearby”. So we traveled about 20 min west, found the dirt road to the correct village. In the truck we had the headman, me, and 3 of the men working on the shed. When we got to the village the negotiating started. Normally a “bunch” of 8foot long grass (about an arm full) is 5000Kwatcha - $1. - but because it was still in the bush we would only pay about 65 cents. we asked how far in the bush it was, and they said they walk 2 hours to the place. No problem - about 15min in my truck. So three more loaded in. We started on the track that was made by oxcart - probably never a car on this road! Many times it looked like we were in the middle of a jungle with no path at all - just making a path the best we could between trees, regularly running over bushes as tall as my hood, the guide seemed to know the way ok. This went on not for 15 min, or 25 or 40, but a full 55 minutes! I was exhausted. The last half mile was thru the “Bogs Of Despondency” - a low bog or tall grass as high as the top of my truck at times that no vehicle had ever come in before - not even an ox cart! And now I know why. They warned me as we started in the bog to go slow because there were “holes” in it! Yikes! But I could not go slow or i would bog down in the bog and never be heard of again. And no way could we see anything ahead because of the tall thick grass. So, with a prayer we took off thru. Twice we hit a pit of sorts that I was not sure we were getting thru - but we did. We loaded the long grass up over the top of the cab, tied it down good and started loading into the truck, but this time the three in the back could not ride back there - so pile on in! That means 5 adults in the back seat, and 3 in the front. So we headed back, and made it again.

As we were getting near the village, we saw the storm clouds coming - and we had another load to get! So we quick off loaded and went back, praying it would not rain till we got out of the bog. A word about the rain here - the drops, I dont know how it defies the laws of physics, but the drops are 3 inches in diameter and carry a pound of water each! So just 10 min of rain in this bog and we would be turning to diamonds in a few centuries! Well, it started coming down just as we started into the bog. Ok, we’re toast. But praise God, we made it out again.

If you love me, will you give God a big thanks again for that truck he gave us. It has proven itself such a blessing to us.

We were all so relieved when we got back to the village, I bought everyone a dough ball - a misshapen lump of dough fried in sugary oil - mmm.

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“No, let me take care of this! You are foreigners,” the man pleaded as he tried to step between us and the girl. The girl could feel his patriotic embarrassment over her condition, and tried to walk away, but we were undeterred and pressed in to help.

She was 25ish, looking a bit disheveled with her corn-rows and pants sprinkled with dirt as if she had been on the ground. She wore a sle

eveless tee shirt tied in a knot in the back, giving her the “profile” of being a bartender at a no-name side street bar, hired to attract some business. But the thing that called out for our attention was the egg-sized swelling of her left eye. She was miserable and disoriented.

I could understand the man’s point: he was of this culture and town, had seen this sort of thing many times before, and knew just what to do - send her back home to suffer in seclusion. We, on the other hand, oozed with “foreign” concern for her misery, and indignation at the crime that must be brought to justice. In this land sympathy is a luxury few can afford.

But who really is the foreigner here? The one who unwittingly is in harmony with dark lords of the air claiming ownership of this world; or the one who is in league with the conquering forces of light, the one who lives in the realization that “every place your foot shall tread” is hers to influence, who acts as if he really is the bearer of light and life whose emanating rays are protons of goodness beating down the neutrons of corru

ption, who understands that the resources of the entire universe are at his disposal - the Deputy of Peace. Now who’s the real foreigner here, eh?

So as we walked the streets late Friday night with that fire-brand “Deputy” Rob Murphy, who loves to overturn the tables of injustice by offering understanding, counsel and hope of a better life to “ladies of the night” right on the very ground of their willing torture, right between clients and experiences that are shattering their souls, I realized that here is a man who understands he can go into the darkest alleys of perversion and, with impunity, release those legally held in prison because he holds a higher authority.

This is the authority Jesus 

walked in - an authority not of this world - yes, foreign, yet the true and rightful owner nonetheless. His miracles did not follow requests to Father, but commands to the elements or the spiritual forces of this age. To me, this indicates not just that his father is more powerful, but that, though he is not of this world, he is the exiled Prince who is in process of coming back to claim His own, and all of creation is at his beck and call. Though foreign, he is no foreigner. And we are his kin!

Later, as we sat on the hospital bench beside Patti (we found out her name), hearing her story of being robbed and beaten and allowing our imagination to fill in the cracks of a soul caught in the backwash of life, we suddenly realized why we were here - to give her a chance of escape! Was this one of the ones “purchased for God with (Jesus’) blood, those from every tribe and tongue and people and nation”?  Were we here, not as sympathetic foreigners, not merely to relieve her suffering for a moment, but as ones deputized to bring home what was purchased? Was this girl one of the rewards of Jesus’ suffering? As we prayed for her and the tears flowed we could see a heart being reunited with her rightful Father’s love.

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