God's Plan in God's Time

On September 10th we visited our church in Worivi. Worivi is a remote village and has a small church. The leadership has led the church with some difficulty over the past years, but thank God they have persevered. A few members of the Videre team also joined us on our visit. As we arrived at the village our car was surrounded by many children. A car full of white people is not a common scene in Worivi. After a while the members of the church gathered and benches and chairs were brought from the surrounding houses to give everybody something to sit on. Two teenage boys were standing at the window at the outside of the church and Abukari called them to come inside.

Worivi village

The service then began. After we had sung, we prayed for the needs of the church and its members. A number of people were sick and we prayed specifically for these individuals. Still people continued to enter the church. The church leader told us that some people from the village had heard we were there and they wanted the Christians to pray for them. They are Muslims who do not normally visit the church – a man with a swollen hand, a woman who has been married for years but still barren, a father with a sick child – but they all came forward to be prayed for. We committed them into God’s hands for healing as well as for open hearts to the Gospel.

Worivi church

Brian, one of the Videre team members, preached from John 4 about the meeting between Jesus and the Samaritan woman; about living water. This is a story that has so much in common with the lives of the people in many villages in Dagbon; to never be thirsty again, but to be full and filled with Jesus Himself, eternal life.

After the church service the two teenage boys came to speak to Abukari. One of them, Adam, indicated that he wanted to give his life to Christ. Wonderful. Whilst Abukari talked with him, many of the church congregation also listened in and heard what Abukari was saying, including some Muslims. An old woman tried to discourage the boys – it is so hard to be a Christian in an environment where people offer resistance. But the boy was determined. Abukari prayed with him and told him that he would meet with him later in the week.

Last Thursday, Abukari had another talk with Adam and his friend, Mareek. Adam told him that he had visited the house of the church leader in Worivi several times to inform him that he is ready to become a Christian. However, each time he went to the house the leader was not at home. On the Sunday we visited the church at Worivi, Adam was riding his bicycle towards Yendi. When he saw that our car turned towards Worivi, he decided to return to the village. Although he was reluctant to enter the church, because of what other people would say, when Abukari called them inside it was as if God Himself had invited them.  Mareek also indicated that he wanted to give his life to Christ. It is so great how God in His time, executes His plan and how many people can be a link in His chain.

Abukari meeting with Mareek (l) and Adam (r)

Last Sunday we visited this church again. However, the boys could not come to church as Adam’s father told them to help with the yam harvest. At the same time Muslim evangelists had come to the village to warn and discourage people about becoming Christians.

Please pray for these two boys, as they will have to face a lot of oppression from family and friends.

The church service last Sunday

Growth that needs our help

The village of D.C. Kura is an old farming community in the Yendi district of the Northern region. The village obtained its name “D.C. Kura” from an old District Chief (D.C.) Executive (a central government representative) from Yendi who had his farm in the village and being a prominent person, the inhabitants decided to name the village after him.

Predominantly, those who live in D.C. Kura believe in the African traditional religious system; their religious worldview lies in the belief that the spiritual is imminent and impinges directly on the living. There is a strong belief that people are surrounded by hosts of spirit-beings which are able to influence the lives of the living for good or for evil. These fearful beliefs in the spirit world enslave the people of D.C. Kura as they often sacrifice animals out of fear to appease the gods and their ancestors (their dead relatives) who are believed to have the power to bless or curse the living depending on the way they live.

In 1992, Pastor Azindow saw the need to establish a literacy class in D.C. Kura, as no one in the entire village was able to read in either their mother tongue language or in English. Through the literacy class the good news of Jesus Christ was heard in the village and this brought a dramatic change to the lives of many inhabitants. They came to know the truth, and the truth indeed has set them free (John 8:31, 32). The gospel really brought liberation to the people as many families gave their lives to Jesus. Also many young men and women enthusiastically started to learn how to read and caught the vision of sending their children to school. In fact the current leader of the D.C. Kura Church, Naakiwu Lamba, was one of the first students who learned to read in their first literacy class. In 1994, two years after the literacy classes started, Mark Hagerup (a missionary with SIM) helped D.C. Kura believers establish a church congregation and since then they have continued to experience spiritual and numerical growth.

The church building at D.C. Kura

Abukari with Naakiwu Lamba, the church leader at D.C. Kura

An occasion last Sunday clearly affirmed this when we were especially invited to witness the graduation of students of the Children’s Sunday school class. When we arrived at the church the 14 young men and women who will be leaving the Sunday school were sitting under a tree, rehearsing the memory verses and songs they were to perform during the church service. Under another tree over 70 children gathered who also attend the weekly Sunday school. The church was full up of adults who are part of the membership of the church of D.C. Kura. When the 14 students entered the 24 x 18 ft church, followed by the 70 children to be part of the service it was obvious that the people of D.C. Kura have outgrown their church building. What a wonderful concern to have - the church is too small!!! Praise the Lord.

We are now taking up the challenge to see how we can make space for all these groups in one church building. Can you pray and stand with us as we try to raise $16,000 to build a church that can accommodate both the adults and children and their activities at the same time.

The Sunday school children are gathered under trees outside

Joke talking to the Sunday school children

The church is too small - people are standing in the aisle and many are still outside

Thank God for: 

• The growth of the Church in D.C. Kura
• The leaders and their commitment towards the adults as well as children in the church 

Pray for:

• This church that it will continue to grow, not only in numbers but also in their faith
• Funds to build a new, bigger church 
• Our trip to Kara, Togo; we hope to be there from 4th-11th September
• For the children who will go back to school (after a long absence) on 12th September
• For the safe arrival of another team from Videre who hope to be in Yendi from 11th-16th September to train a new group of entrepreneurs in ‘Business as Mission’