“Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding
in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor is not in vain in the Lord.”
1 Corinthians 15:58 NKJV
Friends: May our Lord of salvation bless you in His grace
which enables His people to enjoy and serve Him! Our verse above has long been
an encouragement to Kappy and me and we hope that it will encourage you today.
As beloved brethren in the Lord we are to always abound in the work of the
Lord. To abound means that the work is to be done plentifully, as the
dictionary puts it, to exist in large numbers or amounts— like the tropical
plants that fill the land here in Uganda. This implies a steady, continuous,
unstoppable effort that is teeming and plentiful. Wow! May the Lord enable us
in His grace to aspire to this high standard of workmanship in our measure.
Surely Jesus is worthy of a plenteous effort in His service. And the stated
outcome of this type of effort is an abounding, an extremely plentiful, result.
The Lord told the apostles that their fruit would remain as He had appointed
them to do the work that would produce such enduring plenty. What marvelous
things have been wrought in so many lives over the centuries through them and
their labors! May our fruit, in our measure, also remain and be plentiful as
the Lord wills!
This month in our
yearly summary of Mission Africa’s
ministry and highlights in 2018, we are blessed to share with you about some of
the work. We share some stats in the report to communicate clearly about the
work but stats cannot fully define ministry—we use these only as a hopeful help
and indicator. Each precious person touched by the gospel has their own special
and unique story. We are called to work in love for the salvation and good of
people. Following is a summary of each ministry component that we are engaged
in:
Children’s Ministry
This work (2 photos below) consists primarily in
evangelism and discipleship of Children and Youth in Bible Study in Public
Schools and Churches throughout Uganda. In the photos children with HIV are
ministered to. Students also volunteer to take part in Bible Clubs and then
complete Bible Studies; this year about 30,000 will have been completed at
year’s end in 3 countries; most of these were in schools. At times Scriptures
are given to those who complete the studies. We also reach out to needy
children in slums and other settings in Evangelistic Meetings and Christmas and
sometimes Easter Outreaches in which everyone enjoys a good day of Bible
sharing, fun, a good meal and the receiving of small gifts. In our Christmas
Outreach in 2017 we were blessed to
serve about 3,670 people, mostly small children.
Prison Ministry and HIV+ Outreach
We continue to serve HIV+ prisoners and other prisoners in the form of
preaching and visits, a regular evangelistic and discipleship Bible Studies and
in providing much-needed monthly food supplements and aid. Hundreds of
prisoners studied in our Bible Institute course again this year. We serve at
the Main Prison in Kampala and in another prison near Luweero. There is a
shortage of food and nutritious supplements for these people and our hope is to
assist them in the Word and in their need of food and soap. This ministry is
led again this year by Pastor Sunday Kafeero (pictured below with Margo at
his left and food supplements).
Please pray again that God will abundantly bless our Gospel outreaches
and ministries of compassion; that He will save many and that good discipleship
and training will result in many changed lives for Christ’s kingdom.
Street Kid Outreach
In this ministry we continue to evangelize, disciple and seek to
integrate Street Kids into the church and then eventually to reconcile them
with their families, as God allows. We minister to the Street Kids in a Drop-in
Center and Day Shelter which meets in a church building where the Kids are
served with shelter, friendship, food, baths, the gospel, sports and
counseling. This year we were blessed to reconcile a boy home in Busoga— and he
is the # 300th Street Kid to be reconciled over the years! Most of these Kids stay home and off the
streets—we thank the Lord! Pray for Pastor Sunday who also leads this ministry
with his blessed team of helpers which include Kizza, Adam, and Peace (with
their spouses in the photo at an encouragement and lunch meeting that we
enjoyed—the KFC food here is VERY GOODO, somehow it tastes better than in the
US!? Our good friends, Wayside Cross Ministries of Aurora, IL, again this year
collaborated with us in the Discipleship Home for 6 Street Kids. The Kids live
in the Discipleship Home overseen by 2 Helpers, attend school, worship and
learn about Christian living. Many thousands of meals will have been served at
Discipleship Home by year’s end. This year-long ministry culminates in the
Boys’ placement back home where we hope their reconciliation with their parents
will be another step forward in their changed lives. At year end 18 boys will
have completed their time at Discipleship House with all but 2 remaining off
the streets. The Street Boys enjoyed swimming parties again this year. Ministry
to Karamojong girls and women continues this year.
Church Planting
To date the Lord has led us to assist in planting over
1,100 churches/fellowships in Malawi, Zambia, Uganda, Kenya, Rwanda, Burundi,
Congo, South Sudan, Mozambique, Sierra Leone and Nigeria with African pastors
and churches. We estimate that to date about 35,000 people are attending these
churches and fellowships and over 8,000 baptisms have taken place. In this work
we seek to train church planters, encourage their work, then assist the new
church plants by helping in leadership development , evangelism, discipleship
and counsel with the goal of self-sustainability. There is a continuing need
for churches, especially in the rural areas, as the longest distance people can
usually walk to a church is about 5 kms; round trip, that’s about 6.21 miles.
Many of the new churches/fellowships are in rural areas—like the location of
the pastors in the photo below in Kapchorwa, Uganda. Training Centers
continue to assist leaders. These Centers provide needed discipleship,
accountability and teaching for pastors, leaders and church members. Many of
the new churches plant other churches. We were blessed to teach about church
planting in Sierra Leone this year (photo below) and so far the people
have planted 12 churches; there is a great need for grace, spiritual life,
vitality and churches as the people there face a spiritual declension and many challenges in their country. We are
encouraged by the thought that the Lord will surely minister in His churches
and bring the fruit about in them, as He desires, long after we have left the
field. Pray with us that the future
harvest will be very fruitful for His glory!
“I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the
increase. So then neither he who plants is anything,
nor he who waters, but God who gives the
increase.”
1 Corinthians 3: 6,7 NKJV
Preaching and Teaching
Jim continues to serve in this capacity as an itinerant
minister and usually preaches in friends’ churches on the Lord's Day and in
conferences and seminars. Our hope in this ministry is to influence churches to
better doctrine, discipleship and edification and in evangelism. We seek to
minister God's truth as Jim preaches and teaches the grace of God. Pictured
to the left was an exhortation given to pastors in a recent visit. Jim also
ministers the Word in “Sunday Morning” sermons on African Bible College Radio
at 99.3 FM in Kampala. The Lord has blessed and guided this ministry since
2006; this year we celebrated our 12th year with Radio ABC!
Pastoral Development
In this ministry we seek to disciple, instruct and train Pastors and
Ministry Leaders. We do this in personal fellowship and counsel and in teaching
in class, conference and seminar settings. Pastor Training Conferences are held around the country and are often
coupled with Bible and literature distribution. This year we visited and taught
and preached in Ft. Portal (see photo below),
Mbarara, Arua, Koboko, Kapchorwa, Lira, Soroti, Mbale and in Sierra
Leone and Pakistan (photo below). Through the generous gifts of Chaplestreet
Church, First Christian Church, Three Rivers Church and Tyndale Publishers we
distributed 1,074 Life Application Study Bibles and about 700 English and
vernacular Bibles mostly to pastors and leaders in 2018.
Thank you sincerely for your prayers, gifts and
all that you do which enables us to serve the Lord in Africa! May our Lord
Jesus Christ bless you abundantly in your labor for His Kingdom which cannot be
in vain!
Other Outreaches
Other ministries that we continue to be active in are
distributing the Free Grace Broadcaster and other materials as Chapel Library’s
Uganda Distributor. We also serve as a distributor of Chapel Library’s Bible
Institute Materials. Kappy continues to enjoy sharing her monthly “Kappy's
Corner.” We assist needy people with medical problems at times as the Lord
allows and seek to show Christ's mercy to the poor and needy in service and
gifts.
An outreach continues in our ministry collaboration with a
pastor who is working with an unreached people group. Please pray again for God’s grace and protection for him, his family and
ministry. He is working with a people group that has been resistant to
the gospel. But there have been professions of faith made in 4 areas of
outreach and fellowships of believers have been started (in secret meetings). Pray that, as God wills, this outreach will
effectively bring the gospel to this people group, that there will be
conversions and good discipleship for those who come to follow Christ.
“For we are His workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works,
which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.”
Ephesians 2:10 NKJV
KAPPY’S CORNER—Our Quiet Day
During our years in Uganda Jim and I have become used to living
in a place where we never know what to expect. Things are different day to day.
Nothing stays the same. Even the weather is wild and unpredictable a few miles
north of the equator. We do not live in a tame place. I rarely think about that
anymore. However, one recent chilly morning our yard became a combination zoo
and barnyard. The monkeys had been in the neighborhood all week and they chose
that particular day to claim our yard as a playground. To set the scene, a
description of our small yard may be helpful. We have three large mango trees,
two jack fruit trees, five avocado trees, three Mediterranean pine trees, a
bread fruit tree, a huge weeping fig tree, numerous decorative shrubs, three
palm trees, crotons, a tall thick juniper hedge, a gingko biloba tree, and
Jim’s succulent garden. In other words, our yard is like a tall personal forest
and the monkeys feel right at home. For them, playing means screeching,
crashing from tree to tree, quarrelling, and (may I say) preserving the
species. It was the one day during the
week we reserve as our quiet, regrouping day. With a bit of persuasion the
monkeys moved on—temporarily. No sooner had the monkeys gone than my husband
saw a stranger walking in our yard. Jim went to the veranda and asked the young
man how he got in. He seemed confused by the question and repeated something
over and over about chickens. I’d heard an unfamiliar crowing early that
morning and suspected a new arrival in the neighborhood. My suspicions were
confirmed when we found the neighbor’s new rooster (a gorgeously plumed bird,
by the way) happily scratching and eating ants in our grass. It had apparently
come under the fence and the young man had come over the fence to fetch it. He
hastily went back home and Jim chased the rooster back under the fence. We then
settled down to our devotions accompanied by machinery sounds from the
construction sites around us, sirens from the road below, and laughing and
crying neighborhood children. And my wonderful husband was grateful for the early
morning exercise!
This is our life. I
admit, there have been, and are still, times when the sights and sounds
threaten to overwhelm my senses, but those times are few and far between. And
there are times, by contrast, when we’re surprised by the quiet. As I said, we
never know what to expect, but there is one thing we can count on—our God is a
God of order, not chaos, and He is in complete control of His creation. Knowing
Him as The Sovereign, Loving Master over us brings peace—a peace that goes much
deeper than our circumstances.
Thanks and love to you all in our Jesus, Jim and Kappy
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