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Mozambique with Hope Chapel Team, Oct 2013

One of the main focus areas of this trip was to keep preparing the local pastors and Christians to keep up the evangelistic and church growth activities without any foreign visitors. We saw the power of God at work.

Excerpt from Danny’s Report / Prayer Requests, Oct 7 2013

Hi prayer team. So good to have you covering our backs through prayer. After crossing the border into Mozambique, we all immediately jumped into an intercession service at the base, with maybe 60 to 80 persons praying us out to Estima and Songo. And the next morning we all went to a wedding that I officiated in one of the village churches started by Wheresoever.

We're in Estima right now in the middle of a seminar to pastors and leaders in Estima. Just this morning we had a powerful time first teaching about prayer, and then 

Steve preached an intense and very effective sermon giving the pastors advice on how to teach their flock. I found it amazing how he was able to speak to them as a person who fully understands their culture, and he has only been in Mozambique three days - must be the holy Spirit - he had them on the edge of their seats, paying attention, laughing, clapping, etc. And that's even though he's struggling with his stomach - we're not sure whether it's something he ate or dehydration - please pray for him, and for Lindy who is also suffering from a bad stomach ere to hear her but the team was impressed by her teaching as well. It is so good to be back in action with the Wheresoever African team, all contributing in so many ways. For those of you who know them, this trip to Estima and Songo we brought Kenneth, Christiano, Moses, Danny S, Tony, Renato, plus three others who you would not know. And it is SOOO exciting to see God at work. This morning we just found out about this man that had been prayed for back at the base before he came back home to Estima (he was amazed to see us here). His leg was very swollen and the doctors who had not been able to help him told him that they needed to amputate in three days. He was prayed for and it was this morning that we found out that he is walking fine with no pain or swelling.

right now. I love it when visitors who are not accustomed to preach can just arrive and be swept up by the Holy Spirit. Tina taught yesterday afternoon, I could not be th

Last night we had a meeting with the Wheresoever Council of pastors that we formed here when we were last here - must be four to five years ago. They were telling us about their activities over that time. Some have gone by bicycle to find the lost and have started churches as far as 90 km away. They speak about the last seminar so long ago as if it was yesterday, explaining how it helped them so much to pastor their flocks and to expand the Kingdom. They are so hungry! According to them, their greatest need (other than bringing down the Glory of God in Estima) is for more Bibles. It was difficult to tell them that this trip we had not been able to bring them any. Let's pray for more provision for them in the future, whether through Wheresoever or any other means.

The drive from the base to Estima was a bit of a grueling 9-hour drive, arriving here around 2am Saturday night. Yesterday (Sunday) morning, the team was scattered to preach among a number of churches - pastors wait a long time for visitors to come and feed them spiritually - so when it finally happens they line up from early Sunday morning hoping that one of the team can go preach at their church. Everyone had a memorable time, especially Tina who witnessed a number of deliverances as she prayed for each person in the church. After this afternoon's seminar, we held an outreach in the middle of town tonight resulting in hundreds of people accepting Jesus. We introduced three local pastors to them so they could choose where to be discipled.

Steve and Tina arrived from the US a few days ago and almost immediately jumped into action. In Malawi before coming across to Mozambique, they tasted local culture by walking around the area of the house where we were staying. It was good to see them taking in the local culture, but they also witnessed a lot of the people running away from a large group of "traditional dancers", who go around scaring and stealing from people in all their feathers and leaves. They block roads so nobody can pass, but would not stop us as we walked by them - I believe they could sense the Holy Spirit in us. I was told that the reason why they were out in large numbers is because the grave of one of the local chiefs was being prepared, so they were being sent out from the graveyard, as part of their ancestor worship.

 

Excerpt from Danny’s Report / Prayer Requests, Oct 17 2013
In my last update to you, we were in the middle of a seminar for pastors and leaders in Estima, the first location we went to with Tina and Steve. Since then we have completed that seminar and two large outreaches there. And also held a second seminar in Songo, with two more outreaches. More than a thousand persons accepted Jesus into their lives at the outreaches. The last time we came to these areas was five years ago and I believe that no other ministries have visited them since then. Such a warm welcome, they not only remembered us but even remembered the topics that were taught back then. And they claim that the training they received then was responsible for the Kingdom growth that they saw since then.

A number of people on the team had to deal with stomach issues at different times, including Steve, Tina, Lindy, Kenneth and Christiano - and later Steve even had to deal with a cold which has subsided by now. It was amazing how these things did not even slow down anything that was happening. Everyone is fine now.

At the end of the Estima seminar and outreaches, the morning we were leaving for Songo, we found a large group of people waiting for prayer from our team. Some of them had been at the seminar, but many others were just from the community and wanted a touch from God. Half way through it the police showed up accompanied by the chief witch doctor of the area, trying to stop it.  The pastor who is chairman of the Wheresoever council there stood up to them, asking them if they really came to stop what God was doing - they backed off. The whole morning was exciting and pretty intense, even if it did make us late for Songo. At the end of all the Songo activities, the day we were returning on the 9-hour drive back to the mission base, we decided to hold a baptism. Twenty-five people baptized in a very beautiful setting. We had to climb way down a very rocky slope to get to the water, and then do the rock-climb up at the end. But they had neglected to tell us that ahead of time, so we had to do it wearing flip-flops - very interesting.



 

 

 

Hours after returning to the base in Vila Ulongue, we held another overflow crowds service that we call Big Sunday, when we bring together all the nearby Foursquare churches. It was a five-hour service, a lot of praising, worshiping, dancing, preaching, teaching - by all of us. These are always fun, but this one even had a wedding in the middle of it. I think the person that walked the farthest to come was from Mphenda, a village that took us an hour and a quarter to drive to - I have no idea how long it takes them to walk. Hopefully the building of the new big church can be completed soon-ish so we don't have to keep sending people away. To complete the basic structure, it's just missing the rest of the cement beam around the top, a few more rows of bricks, and the roof including trusses and iron sheets. Please pray for funds to come in to complete that project.  Other than a very generous donation to help with part of the foundation, they have done all this on their own, but are now struggling to come up with the expense of the roof.

 

The next day, Monday, we drove to Mphenda village to hold another baptism. This time 8 village people were baptized, mostly elderly. After that they didn't want us to go until we preached to them. We did that and some of them were also baptized in the Spirit. Thank you Holy Spirit. They were so thrilled that we had to drive away with a number of gifts including a live chicken and a goat leg. They also cooked a lot of food for us as a surprise, but since we would have had to take their dishes we did not accept those gifts. On the return they sent us on a shortcut - but we needed to cross this wooden bridge that we had to walk across to remove weight from the car, and I still wondered if the car would make it without the bridge giving way. It did.

On Wednesday (yesterday), before driving across the border to Malawi for the airport drop-off, we gave food gifts to about 50 orp

hans in village Chisamba, and another roughly

 40 orphans near the base, and left food for a number of other orphans that could not come because they were in school. The food should be enough to feed each orphan for just under a month. This is important especially now since they are in what the call the "hunger time". We were also able to help 15 widows with good quality wraps in addition to the food. We thank God for the specific donation from one person that allowed us to do this. It would be so good to be able to do it again in our absence in January/February which is when the hunger-time reaches the most dangerous point. Please pray for their health.

It has been a pretty full schedule. But when the fruit is so visible it's hard to get tired. Help us to keep praying for the people of Mozambique.

All for Jesus,
love and bucket-fulls of blessings,
danny