You are a coward, go back to the Church!

Sometimes when we minister cross-culturally, we hear the best (and funniest) stories. This one happened recently, during a meeting with a local group of pastors at our monthly church leadership gathering.

Mike was sitting with 3 other church leaders just sharing about life and specifically about what they were learning in regards to discipleship.  One of the pastors shared how lately he has been struggling in his faith as he has not been able to get a job and so he can't provide for his family (most pastors here are not employed by the church).  Responding to him, one of the others (Let's call him Pastor A. for the purpose of this story) shared a bit of his life story.

Pastor Vukile

Pastor A. said he had been following the Lord for over 20 years, and during this time he has had countless trials.  He has experienced tremendous family pain, including having his father commit suicide, having family members lying and attacking each other and persecution for his decision to follow Christ.  On top of this, there were many times of not having enough to eat and many challenges that come with living in poverty.

However throughout this Pastor A.'s faith remained strong.  But about 10 years ago, there was a fight in his church as the woman he wanted to marry was not the one that the church wanted him to marry.  He had gone back to his home province and community and had picked a Christian woman there he wanted to marry, but the church wanted him to marry one of their members.

[Marriages here involve a whole lot more than just 2 people!]

Typical Xhosa wedding

Being attacked by people inside the church left Pastor A. disillusioned, and even after years of trials that he had overcome in his faith, this became overwhelming for him to the point of him walking away from the church and his faith.

Songoma (witch doctor)

After spending some time not walking with the Lord, pastor A. was looking for some guidance about what to do next in life.  He turned to the local songoma (witch doctor) and asked what kind of a job he should pursue.  The songoma looked at him and said, "You have the Holy Spirit, there is nothing I can do for you.  You must go back to the Church to find guidance."  Slightly annoyed at this advice the former pastor went to get a 2nd opinion from a different songoma.  However this 2nd songoma repeated "You have the Spirit of Christ, you need to search the Bible not ask me for guidance."  Pastor A. however still wasn't convinced so he went to a 3rd songoma who said to him, "You are a coward, you have already received your answer, go back to the Church!"

So he humbled himself, repented of his ways, turned to the Word, committed himself back to the Lord and went back to the church.  The pastor used his story to just encourage the other to trust in God, that even in the hard times the Holy Spirit is ALWAYS faithful and He is with us!

A year gone boom

Guys, seriously!!!  The year didn't just go by, it went BOOM with a BANG.  Like "wow".  Some of it felt long, some of it felt short, but after being in South Africa for a year, we marvel more than ever at the work of God and His ability to reach out, save and transform lives.   

This is no joke, we (you all included) serve a God who is alive, He reigns over all the earth, calling His creation back to Himself.  AH!  We are so stinking privileged to serve Him, and our family is so privileged, by His grace, to be in a ministry in South Africa where we see His hand moving daily. WOW.

Mike has been teaching Faith Discovery group every six weeks since February, and then every Wednesday he teaches a follow up class with these same students.  He almost always starts off the classes with an opportunity for them to share what God has been doing in their lives.  It never ceases to amaze me the stories he shares about how God changed the students lives during their time at Hope Africa.

• One student shares how God has changed their attitude to enable them to let go of their anger.   
• Another student shares how God has helped them forgive someone they never thought they could forgive.  
• Another student testifies to how God has healed their lungs from lifelong breathing problems.   
• Another testifies how God has given them a passion to know Jesus.   
• Another testifies how for the first time in their life they felt the presence of the Holy Spirit as they gave their life to him!

And that's just one week's worth of testimonies, this happens every Wednesday.  And that is entirely based on the work God has done, and we get to be a part of that.  

Mike says: 

"I now come to Faith Discovery Group weeks with huge expectations about what God is going to do.  I know that the students will have gone through severe trauma and struggles in their lifetimes.  Before every week starts, my co-teacher Mawande and I, spend a lot of time praying for what God wants to do.  I know that on Monday as Mawande and I share our testimonies, God will open the doors for our students to open up about their life stories." 

There are always 2 groups of about 15 students taking the class at a time.  We now know ahead of time that in each group:

• Many will share about not having enough food.
• 14 of the 15 of them will have no fathers in their lives.
• 7 or 8 of the 15 will have one or both parent(s) dead.
• 3 or 4 will have been rejected by not only their father, but also their mother and that they were raised by a grandma or aunt.   
• 1 will share about being raped, and as she shares, another 3 or 4 will start deeply weeping immediately as she says the word.

Mike says: 

"But we also know that God is the good Father.  And as we begin to teach about God, the good Father, who is forgiving, just and loving, we know that through the Holy Spirit there is freedom, there is healing, there is power to forgive others, there is the forgiveness of sin.  Through Jesus, we can be made right with God again, restored according to His plan from before creation even began!"

He continues: 

"This past week in Faith Discovery Group, God blew me away yet again!  And as I heard the students testimonies in our follow up from our last week of class, I think about their life stories they shared last Monday and I am so deeply humbled.  I am so humbled by their authenticity, by their openness, and by their hope in spite of despair all around them.  I am so humbled to see God working through our ministry. 

In particular I am humbled by being used by God last Friday, when I was able to go around and pray with 7 students.  When I came to the first student, I asked him what God had been teaching him last week.  He said, “I want to respond to Jesus’ call and follow Him.”  So I talked with him about counting the cost and making sure this is really what he wants, and as he affirmed it, I lead him in a simple prayer of repentance and turning to Jesus. 

I proceeded to talk to the next student and she tells me that she actually gave her life to Jesus for the first time while I was reading Isaiah 53, and as she did that she felt the presence of the Holy Spirit in her life. 

The next person asks me to pray for them as they are struggling to forgive the deep hurts from their abusive father. 

The next two students I talked to, also make first time commitments to Christ.  And then 2 more, asked for prayer for various struggles and hardships.

For those that know me personally, sometimes I think that driving Camaros or Arctic Cats, or playing hockey is fun.  But there is nothing like watching someone experience the joy of salvation, never mind four in one day!  This makes me so deeply humbled to be used by God is this way."

The prodigal son comes home

I’ve got a pretty sweet story to share with you guys!!  Are you ready for this???  (say it louder I can't hear you).

So after Mike was done teaching his first Faith Discovery Group class (you can read all about in the  last blog), himself and Mawande (fellow staff) started following up with our students once day/week for 5 weeks.  They have since changed the structure, but I wanted to share one of the stories that came out of the follow up group, because it’s just too awesome.

On the day follow-up time was planned for, Mike and Mawande got held up in a meeting, and by the time they went outside to find the students, they had already left.  Feeling somewhat discouraged, they sat down in the courtyard and started to pray for the students, and discussed ways they could continue to develop the follow-up process.  There were 2 students in particular that they felt were on the verge of making first time commitments to Christ, and they had just been talking about them that morning to our staff asking our staff to also be praying for them.

After about an hour, Mike and Mawande went back into the office to continue with the day’s work.  Maybe two minutes after they got into the office, reception calls them to tell them that some people are there to see them.  So they went outside and those exact 2 students were waiting to see them!

One of them starts to say:

“yeah we thought we would come say hi to you guys since we missed you an hour ago.”

Then the other speaks up and says,

“tell them the real reason we came back.”

 The first student then says,

“we came back because we want to have the class, we want to talk more about how to follow Jesus.”

Mike writes:

"So, Mawande and I proceeded to sit down with them and talk about how to be born-again. We then spent lots of time in prayer with them, and one of the two students gave his life to Jesus! What an incredible privilege to watch someone move from darkness to light, to see their burdens removed from their shoulders as they come in repentance to Jesus!!!

The other student was not quite ready to take that step, but allowed us to continue to dialogue and pray with him.  This is the same student who in my previous blog update shared how he would trade his wife and kids for money, as life was all about money for him.  So even though he was not ready to take that step of giving his life to Jesus yet, God had been making serious progress working in his life.”

But this isn’t all folks...  Keep reading!!!  (I know this story is a bit long, but it gets even better!!!)

Two weeks later, in the morning this second student drops by.  He shares with Mike and Mawande that after the classes he went through a really hard time, and started to consider suicide.  There in that place, he heard God calling out to him to surrender his life, and like the prodigal son, come home.  And so he did!  Since then in the last 2 weeks he has literally been going to church every day, he is alive with new life in Christ!  It is stunning to watch as the Holy Spirit has taken this student from a place where all he wanted in life was money, to now all he wants in life is Jesus.  

On Tuesday, he was back at Hope Africa again inquiring about how to sign up for our month long discipleship course called EPIC (Equipping People in Christ).

Please continue to pray for him in his new walk with Christ, that he would grow into full maturity in Christ, that he would be good soil that the message of the kingdom would flourish and produce a harvest 30, 60, even 100 times that which was sown in his life!

Faith Discovery Group - "I want to apply him to more areas of my life"

As you might have heard already, in the beginning of February Mike had the huge privilege of teaching the first ever Faith Discovery Group at Hope Africa Collective.

Mike taking his work very seriously...

But first, during December and January, "my man" spent much of his time working with a Xhosa co-worker named Mawande Mani, to write the material for this course (see my sister-in-law’s post for more information about this man of God  http://charlenefast.blogspot.ca).  In case you don't have time to read it, it is safe to say that we have a special family bond with uncle Mawande, although he has yet to realize we're not actually related.

Mawande - A.K.A. Petti is Vincent's BFF

The goal of the course was to introduce the students to Jesus-Christ, as the large majority of our students are not following Him, even though some of them might call themselves Christians.

Mawande loves teaching students and using white boards.

This is what Mike had to say about how the class went, and boy-oh-boy it’s worth reading (and not just because I said so)!!!

“Our first class was amazing!  We had 10 students and immediately on day 1, God was working in powerful ways.  We opened up the class so that everyone could share a little about themselves, and it was incredible to witness how the Spirit just opened up these students to share powerful and painful life experiences that they have struggled through.  We prayed and ministered to them, and praised God for how His hand was working early on.

Our students also engaged with us in what we were teaching.  For example, when talking about money, one of our students who is about a 30 years old said if offered the choice between money and his wife, he would immediately chose money and leave his wife.  And then if offered the choice between money and his children, he would abandon his kids.  

Xhosa girl in Phillipi near HAC

And from many conversations like this we presented how different Jesus teaches us to look at our world and our values.  We spent time teaching about how Jesus related to people and how Jesus desires to relate to them.  We spent time discussing the Kingdom of God and His magnificent plans for our world.  Finally, on Friday, we presented the finished work of Christ on the cross and through to the resurrection.

The group was quiet as we gave time for reflection and response.  Mawande and I then went person to person and just asked what was happening in their hearts and minds and how we could pray for them.  Here are a few of the words that they shared:

“I want God’s love in my life.”  (This was the student who had at the beginning of the week wanted to trade in his wife/kids for money)

“God has awoken my heart.”

“I feel more connected with God, I felt his presence.”

“I have felt abandon by God because of serious sickness in my life.  Now I feel encouraged that God loves me!  I haven’t been to church in 3 years, but I want to go back to church.”

“I want to follow Jesus, he has helped me to forgive people this week.  I want to apply him to more areas of my life.  I learned that God has good plans for me.”

I was so blown away by these testimonies and each one took significant steps towards God.  To hear a student on their own say “I want to apply him to more areas of my life” is massively encouraging for Mawande and I as we lead these classes."

Mike excited about how well the class went

So thank you for praying for Mike and Mawande, and please continue to pray for them as they follow up with these students over their remaining weeks in Life Development at HAC.  Please pray for them as they are seeking the Lord, that they will completely surrender their hearts and lives to him.