Mission Africa

African Mission Trip Presentation -  Jan 17-28 2008

Introduction by Kay LaBare:

I am privileged to be a member of the Mission Africa team that has recently returned from South Africa and Mozambique along with my teammates Bob McIntyre and Craig Mason.

We are grateful to be part of Damascus Road Community Church that has such a world wide heart for missions.

We have so much we want to share with you about the Africa Mission.  It would take us several hours.  Here we go trying to compress this into 5 minutes! Trip is way too weak a word and adventure doesn’t include the seriousness of the experience although we had lots of laughs as well. Bob, Craig, and I were blessed and sent off by a generous mission-oriented church.

What a gift to us this trip was!  I think it is fair to say that we will never be the same again and we truly witnessed God’s hand on a daily basis.

We were very impressed by the Tugela Ferry, South Africa and Maputo Mozambique.  They have different philosophies and histories, but they both have a wonderful spirit and incredible needs.  We believe DRCC can partner with both areas. 
We want to serve the orphans of both places – victims of AIDS, TB, and in the case of Mozambique – a long and devastating civil war.

Tugela Ferry

Our first mission visit was in Tugela Ferry, South Africa at the Rock of Life church. Tugela Ferry is in the state of Kwazulu-natal and is part of a beautiful valley that is home to about 1 million people.  On the screen is a picture of the Tugela River and a typical Zulu home.

Our host was a woman named Elzeth. Elzeth is an amazing Godly woman from a missionary family who is like the COO and visionary of this mission.

When we arrived we had a meeting set with the church elders which started off a little strange.  Only a couple of the 20 elders showed up.  We soon learned the reason the rest of them were late, which was one of the many God stories we discovered on our trip.

The Elders were serving at multiple funerals in the surrounding area. Funerals are one of the major ministries of the church.  The non-Christians Zulu’s practice ancestor worship and /or witchcraft. However even they like to have Christians at the funeral.  Funerals are attended by everyone in the area.  The church men go early and dig the grave and the church women come and make food which earns them the respect of the men and woman.  Later the Elders are allowed to preach at the funeral and speak the gospel. For many people, this is the first time they hear the hope of Jesus Christ and recognize the Truth.  There are tragically too many funerals caused by the aids epidemic, but God is using these funerals as a vehicle to spread His gospel and turn despair into hope.

On the screen is a picture of us with the senior pastor Baba, his wife along with Elzeth.
Their Church vision is simple - “Win Souls". Aside from the main church, the church has about a dozen other services each Sunday around the valley led by the elders. The Rock of Life mission also supports a Christian school, a step down Aids care facility and food supplies to 700 families in need in the valley.  These families are often led by Grannies with young orphaned children.  Homes here serve as the orphanage in a foster care model. There are such strong ties to the tribe for personal identity, that taking children away from the families would hurt their chances of ever assimilating back into the community. This puts a terrible strain on the grannies as they are the ones who have born the responsibility of raising the children from victims of this terrible epidemic. 

Our church Mission board has approved the giving of several gifts to aid this mission. The first gift is funds to help build and repair the homes of the grannies that are caring for the orphans. On the screen is a picture of one of the homes that is in need. Our vision at DRCC is to “Build Homes of Light through the Power of Jesus Christ”. We strongly believe that our vision can be fulfilled in Africa by helping provide decent shelter for the children and caregivers that are serving our Lord.

Our second gift is to help fund a day care center to give relief to the grannies during the day and provide a way for these small children to start feeling the loving power of being part of God’s family.

Our third gift we are giving is the funding of a full-time evangelist to spread the gospel and provide hope in the homes of the orphans.  He will be the hands and feet on the ground for our church.

Mozambique Visit

When we left Tugela Ferry, we were convinced that this was where God wanted us.  We clearly felt God at work in the church and in the people there.  What we found at the orphanage in Mozambique was different, but every bit as humbling and inspiring as Tugela Ferry had been. 

Cassia Carvalho-Pacheco, our host, translator, friend and guide, introduced us to the orphanage in Machava outside Mozambique’s capital city, Maputo.  The drive out to the orphanage showed us what desperate straits the people of Mozambique are in.  Mozambique has been ravaged by 20 years of civil war, terrible poverty and natural disasters.  We passed mile after mile of shacks and smoldering garbage dumps intermixed.

The orphanage is a 100 acre oasis and much more what we think of as a traditional orphanage.  There are around 65 boys and 35 girls, ages ranging from 4 to 20 living there in sparse concrete buildings.  We met Jesse the senior pastor, Gigi, the assistant pastor, and his wife Adriana, the music director.  Along with Jesse’s wife, they run the orphanage.  We toured the grounds and Jesse proudly showed us what they had accomplished and what the needs are.  His heart for the children and his sense of humor were very apparent.

On the grounds they’ve built classrooms to school over 500 students.  There is not much to them, but they are superior to what the government offers.  They also have a church that regularly draws around 400 people. 

As in Tugela Ferry, we felt God at work through this ministry and feel led to partner with them, too.  Damascus Road through its Mission Africa has donated funds to help build a playground and sports field.  We are also providing funding for school supplies and improvements.  And finally, a gift has been given to provide clothes, blankets and housing improvements for the children. 

Vision:

We want Damascus Road Community Church to extend their amazing commitment to missions to include Africa and specifically these 2 places – Tugela Ferry and Maputo.  We want to continue to develop our friendship with these wonderful Christians and support them as Jesus supports each of us.

Here’s Our Ask: 

Please take out your program insert. Their biggest need is prayer – isn’t that wonderful?  In the midst of so little and so much evil and witchcraft, it becomes clear that prayer and Jesus Christ are the only hope.  Are you touched by Africa?  Please let us know if you can be on the Africa prayer team, and please let us know what your specific involvement can be.  (part of daily prayers, prayer group that meets, etc).

We also need a research team to look for other funding and grants to help the orphans with food, medical care, schools and housing. If you have experience in that area, please let us know on the card.

We also discussed with you our desire to set up a web-site that we can use for further fund raising and to provide a tool that we can use to share the work you are doing. We are going to use technology to expand this mission (and potentially other Damascus Road missions) outside Damascus Road by implementing a website to enable people to explore the Africa Mission and be able to sponsor a specific need using a shopping cart analogy. In turn, our African friends will post pictures of the gifts we send them.  We will also have a place where we can pray and share our hearts and needs with each other.  We are forming a team to work on this – please let us know if you can help in any of the areas on the form.  (Vision, design, build, maintain, administrative, etc).

In Conclusion: 

This is just such a small part of what we saw and heard and did!  We are really looking forward to growing this mission to help these children grow strong and healthy with a great love for Jesus.

Biggest takeaway – We went thinking physical needs would be the biggest need but the biggest Need is Hope.  The hope that only Jesus can provide.   And the local church really is the hope of the world.  We can help build homes of light in Africa.