An alligator in the Nesbit Castle Hotel

Conference with the men from around Bulwayo

Todd teaching the men from Bulawayo

On Sunday around noon we finally meet with the Apostle Liberty Atawa for the first time in person. We were speaking with him about the problems in Zimbabwe for the spread of the Gospel. He complained that no one wants to listen to teaching. “They will say, ‘yesterday we were dancing and singing and today we are only talking.’”

Liberty gathered twelve men for us to meet briefly with on Sunday night, and another five for a total of seventeen which gathered together on Monday for study. Again since it was our first meeting with these men we went through the CLC statement of faith and purpose. Already in our brief talk Sunday night many of the men were eager to be taught. They expressed a great desire in the possibility of going to school at the Bible School in Tanzania, even though that would mean leaving their homes and families for five years. A few of them were already taking correspondence courses from a Bible School in South Africa, and a few were enrolling in classes at local bible colleges.

During our conference on Monday there were definitely some questions and even some lively debate. These mainly centered on speaking in tongues/miracles, baptism, and women in the church. I always find it far more encouraging when pastors ask questions and challenge what I am teaching rather than simply nod along in agreement. For one it shows they care. For another it shows they are familiar with God’s word (they were often taking me to passages ). For a third it shows that they know what their churches teach. And for a fourth it shows they have the backbone to stand up for what they believe to be right. Furthermore they often seemed not to be asking so much because they disagreed with us but because these were arguments they faced and questions the wrestled with. For example I noticed that the man who was grilling me most ardently on speaking in tongues was also the quickest and loudest to clap after Todd and I had answered those questions with scripture.

After everything it was a very encouraging meeting. We pray that the Lord would continue to bless the work through Pastor Gullerud and Liberty here. Liberty is going to continue to meet with these men every month and take them through more lessons, which Pastor Gullerud will be sending him. Hopefully when a missionary returns next year there will be seventeen solid foundations and even more in the process.

In Christ, Matthew Ude

The Pastors from Bulawayo, Zimbabwe

Pastor Ibrahim pretending a bowl is a hat

Victoria Falls

Todd Ohlmann, Ibrahim, Matthew Ude at Victoria Falls

Friday January 27^th we held a short conference with the pastors from Lusaka, and pastor Yumba from D R Congo. Pastor Yumba had accompanied us from Lubumbashi in order to meet the new pastors in Lusaka. As this was our first meeting with these men we took them through the CLC statement of faith and purpose. These men had already been studying with Ibrahim and were familiar with our doctrine. There were some questions, but not really any disagreement. The men seemed ready and eager to study and learn and join Ibrahim in working for the Lord in Lusaka, and throughout Zambia.

We ended the conference at 3pm and Todd, Ibrahim, and I packed up for the trip to Bulawayo, Zimbabwe. We had intended to take a plane but there are apparently no direct flights. The journey by car it is close to 15 hours. So we had decided to drive to Livingstone Friday night and get a bus from Victoria Falls City to Bulwayo on Saturday. Saturday morning we woke up and since Victoria Falls is right there we stopped to see it. There is little I can say about Victoria Falls other than to simply state that is without a doubt the most amazing things I have ever seen in my life. I will post a few picture but of course they can hardly do it justice.

Zimbabwe ran into a bit of economic trouble a few years back and was having some serious currency problems; as a result they took a rather unique solution. They quit printing money altogether. Instead they just use American Dollars. Almost everyone will apparently accept Euros, and Pounds as well but as far as I could tell Dollars were the predominant form of currency. However they don’t use American coins instead if they have to give you change for less than a dollar they give it in Rand (from South America). It all seems like it would be a bit confusing for them but for us it made things easy.

[I will post more pictures of Victoria Falls later ]

[ note: I updated the map "Central Africa Visits" ]

Thursday, our first day in Lusaka, we spent running errands trying to find tickets to Bulawayo, changing money, etc. Today we headed out for hospital visits and evangelism. We stopped briefly at an AIDS/HIV hospital but there was some program going on and we weren’t allowed in. We went down the road a little to a village and started visiting houses. At the bottom of this post is a map of the village and houses we visited along with a description of what happened at each place. There is also another map showing the various place in Lusaka mentioned here.

Pastor Ibrahim is a native of Tanzania. He went to the Bible School in East Africa before the trouble we currently are having there. He has worked with Nathanael Mayhew. He had some friends recently ask him to come teach in Zambia, so he came over to Lusaka and has been working hard here ever since. From the first moment we met Ibrahim he showed his love and zeal for Christ. He constantly talked about how we must not waste the Lord’s money. He always sought to find the cheapest way to do things, even though we were the ones paying not him. He also spoke about how many pastors are lazy but that we must work to support the work of the Gospel. He is planning to return to East Africa in time for the mission helper trip this summer, so that those of you who will be here this summer will get a chance to meet and work with him also.

Here is the map showing the various places that we visited around Lusaka.

Here is the map showing the village where we did evangelism.

[Click on the Red Box with the white magnifying glass ( left hand side of the map about half way up ) to view full screen map]

Wednesday January 25, 2012

This morning we packed up at 8am to head out. This time we left Congo for good and headed across the same border once again unto Zambia. We rented a Taxi to take us to the Zambia border. From the border we took a small bus ( really a big van stuffed full of people ) to Kitwe. Kitwe is the same city where we meet the Zambia pastors on Monday. In Kitwe we got on a big greyhound style bus for the six hour trip to Lusaka. This bus would have been comfortable except that they didn’t leave until every single seat on the bus was sold. And of course the seats were too small even for a normal person much less some of the bigger Africans. I had an aisle seat and spent the ride half off the seat. Todd was sitting on the back seat and was squished between two people.

We arrived in Lusaka around 8pm almost exactly twelve hours from when we started. The Kewelle Lodge where we are staying is a decent price and fairly nice, especially by the standards of most of the hotels we normally stay in. Apparently there is a big soccer match between the Zambia national team and someone else. So the bar and restaurant is packed full of people tonight.

We meet Ibrahim and received our marching orders for the next few days. We will be here at the Kewelle Lodge for the next four nights including tonight and then we leave for Zimbabwe. One of the first things we need to do tomorrow is look for tickets to Zimbabwe either by bus or plane.

Tuesday January 24, 2012

Monday morning we went through a large part of the Statement of Faith and Purpose. Todd was gone most of the morning trying to exchange money so that we could pay for our hotel. We started class around 10:30am and needed to leave around 1pm. Obviously we didn’t get a chance to talk to these pastors about everything but Pastor Yumba will continue to have classes with them every other month.

Two of the pastors Amos and Alexander drove us back to the border between Zambia and Congo in their car. It was probably about an hour to the border, and then another two to three hours from the border back to Lubumbashi.

The next day went really well. We had classes for three hours. After lunch we meet with various pastors and committee.

The translation committee has a number of new translations they have finished and published, as well as publishing a lot of other material which had been translated in the past.

Pastor Hubert, Pastor Muzukuza’s son is hoping to attend one of the bible colleges next year, perhaps the one in Tanzania if we get it up and running again, or the one in Nigeria.

In the evening we went out in search of a restaurant. Todd had mentioned one really good restaurant in the city that he and Nathanael had visited when they were here. Todd couldn’t remember the name and although he thought he knew where it was, we kept getting lost looking for it. That night we gave it one more try. When we once again couldn’t find it we ended up eating at the same place we had eaten at all week. It was a good restaurant though so it wasn’t any problem.

Friday January 20, 2012

Busy day.

I was unable to get my Zambia visa in the US, I just didn’t have time to get all of the ones I needed. So that was one of my first concerns on arriving in Congo. Thursday night we went to the Zambia embassy were I got the form and was asked to return tomorrow with $80 US dollars and two passport photos. The photos I had with me so that wasn’t a problem. The next morning we arrived handed over everything and were told to come back after noon. The lady who was helping us at the Zambia Embassy kept telling me, “I am doing you a favor.” She wasn’t really doing anything except what she was supposed to be doing but the Congo men explained this meant that I should give her a bribe. We came back around 2pm and after waiting for an hour finally got my passport with the visa back. TIA!

We were supposed to spend two hours in the morning and again two hours in the afternoon teaching the pastors and elders of the ELCC. The shenanigans with my visa cut into this time a bit so that both periods were only an hour and a half. Todd taught a basic overview of predestination and I went through the work of the Holy Spirit as described by Jesus in John 16. We also visited one of Muzukuza’s two churches in Lubumbashi that evening after class.

Thursday January 19, 2012

Arrived in Democratic Republic of Congo. The airport in Lubumbashi is undoubtedly the worst I have ever been in. Todd told me stories of him and Nathanael getting stuck here when they came through, but we didn’t have any real difficulties. There was one small door from the immigration office into the baggage claim area, with everyone pressing their way through. Three different times when I was just about to make my way through the door some official insisted on looking at my yellow fever immunization certificate pulling me out of line to do it, then I would have to turn around to try to push my way through again and get stopped right when I was about to get through.

Finally getting through to the baggage area we were met by a delegation from the ELCC and CCLC, seven or eight pastors in total. Arriving at the hotel we had a beer together and discussed our plans for the week.

The weather here in Congo is also quite pleasant. I didn’t realize this at the time but later in the week found out the Lubumbashi at least is fairly high in elevation about 4,000 feet. The sun gets a little intense around midday but the temperatures seem to be around low to high 70s, and there is no humidity.

Wednesday January 18, 2012

Flew from Nigeria to Ethiopia. I was here only for an overnight layover and to meet up with Todd. My flight landed around 8am but I didn’t get to the hotel until after nine, and I needed to leave for the airport again the next morning around 6:30am so I didn’t get much of a chance to see or enjoy Ethiopia. But the climate was certainly much cooler and more pleasant than Nigeria. Nigeria’s climate had been surprisingly pleasant for most of my visit, except the first and the last few days. The humidity and temperature had noticeably climbed.

. . . you know there is a big disaster. I can’t remember the ever seeing my grandmother run anyway.

This is one of the Nigerian sayings that Pastor Bassey quoted as the introduction to his sermon this last week.

I spent the last week near the city of Badagari in Nigeria. Here most of the pastors from Nigeria, Ghana, and Togo gathered together for a joint West Africa pastoral conference. This was caused mainly by the political insecurity of Nigeria. Since it seemed abnormally unsafe for me to journey to Efa we brought all the pastors together near Lagos, Nigeria. Once there of course we needed something for them to do. I was also hoping that it would be a good chance for Kossi and the men from Togo to learn from the deeper theological understanding of the Nigerian men. Besides the original reasons it turned out to be an excellent opportunity for me to hear the pastors speak and preach. An opportunity I have seldom had before since I am usually the one preaching. Further I learned a lot just by being able to socialize daily with the pastors. The Nigerians who regularly hold conventions and conferences on their own were excited now because of the addition of men from Ghana and Togo.

There was some last minute difficulty caused by the nationwide strike in Nigeria. At the beginning of the year the Nigerian government removed subsidy on fuel. This meant the gas prices at the pump jumped immediately from 65 nira per liter ( $1.52 /gallon ) to 110 nira per liter ( $2.57 /gallon ). The National Labor Committee started a strike on Monday January 9^th. The same day the pastors were planning on traveling from Efa to Lagos. Martin Essien however, knowing the problems this would cause quickly rescheduled their travel for Sunday night. The men from Ghana and Togo were not as easy to reschedule but because most of their travel took place across Togo and Benin it didn’t delay them too badly. They showed up late Monday night and were ready for the conference on Tuesday morning. Otherwise the strike really didn’t cause problems for the conference. Although it made it impossible for me to visit Efa even for a single day.

Present at the conference was one young man named Jospeh Kofi Ackah from Ghana. Previously in contact with Steve and Gretchen Eichstadt, Joseph had contacted me about the possibilities of beginning a church in Ghana. We met here at the conference where we were able to spend a little time in study each day. He asked for baptism and agreed to attend the Bible Institute in Efa, Nigeria. His hope is to return to Ghana after his time at the Bible Institute.

Pastor Kossi Blewu from Lome, Togo arrived with more joyful news. Currently serving two congregations in the city of Lome, Pastor Kossi has four new outreach areas he wishes to pursue. Two at various places around the city of Lome where small mission congregations are already present. And two more in the country of Benin were an acquaintance of Kossi who gave his life to the Lord has donated land hoping these places may be used to build churches.

May the word of grace continue forth by the power of the Holy Spirit,

Pastor Matthew Ude

Saturday evening. I’m in Atlanta Georgia about to board my flight for Nigeria. Usually I fly through London which means a seven hour flight to London then another eight or nine hour flight down to Nigeria. This time, however, I am flying through Atlanta an hour and a half from Chicago to Atlanta and then a ten hour flight across the Atlantic. It will be nice to cut so much time out of my flight.

I have spent a month back in that states hoping it was enough time to get all my visas for the Africa trip this January. I got them all except one, Zambia. However I should be able to pick that one up in Lagos while I am there.

There are many things to look forward to on this trip. The trip begins next week with a conference of all our West African churches together in Lagos Nigeria. There will be sermons and papers and I will have a chance to visit with and talk to most of the pastors in this part of the world. There will also be one or two new pastors interested in talking about the CLC at this conference.

After this week long conference I will be joining up with Pastor Todd Ohlmann and journeying down to the Democratic Republic of Congo. This is part of the world I have not been to before. I will meet new pastors, see a new part of Africa, talk to new (for me) churches, and then get a chance to visit some prospective new fields in the Congo area.

I’ll try to keep you all updated, but the internet in Africa is very spotty and I don’t know how often I will have the chance.

Keep the conference and our Africa brothers in your prayers.

“Continue earnestly in prayer, being vigilant in it with thanksgiving” – Colossians 4:2

Pastor Matthew Ude