Beloved friends and family! Here is a brief update on our trip! (I use the word brief because if we were to write all the crazy ways we saw God at work these last few weeks, this blog would never end!) God blew our brains and hearts and exceeded all expectations! Your prayers were all felt and now we sit back in awe and thanksgiving…
Our team was made up of seven young Americans and eight Africans. We partnered with a handful of passionate and humble JAM missionaries who are serving long term in Mavhusa, a village in Limpopo. Mavhusa is a spiritually dark village that suffers from issues of poverty, abuse, lack of employment, witchcraft and drugs and alcohol. But through His children who live there and the JAM missionaries God is breaking chains and transforming it into a village of light,
Our big prayer before we began our trip was, “God, please show us how we can best love the people of Mavhusa.” The answer God put on our hearts was the simplicity of Jesus and the simplicity of love. And so we went out with no agenda but to simply love everyone we met to the cross of Jesus Christ. We went around telling Jesus Stories to everyone who would listen. Here are five short stories of what God did with these:
On one of the first nights, a handful of our team got to pray with one of the many traditional healers who live in the village. Traditional healers attempt to heal people using a combination of rituals, herbs and ancestral worship. Most traditional healers are completely against anything related to Christianity and some use their rituals to cause harm on the village, but this woman allowed us into her house and asked us to pray for her knees and legs. The best of this healer’s own medicine and rituals could not even heal her own body.
We prayed for God to heal this woman and returned a few nights later with a chicken dinner we had prepared for her. She was so happy to receive the food and said she felt so loved because we came and spent time with her and provided the gift of a meal. The next morning we returned to share a Jesus Story with her. We shared the story of when Jesus healed the crippled man at the pool and how Christ has the power to heal. The woman stated that she didn’t know Jesus and we shared the gospel with her. Then the woman declared that her knees and legs haven’t been hurting since we prayed for her and that it was Jesus who healed her! She stated that she also knows Jesus’ love because He sent us to love her!
A young man was at the house listening to the whole thing. He had come to the healer from another village for her to heal his neck. The woman told us she couldn’t heal the man’s neck and asked us to pray for him so Jesus could heal him too! The traditional healer was giving us her clients to heal in Jesus’ name! Later that day, we ran into the healer’s daughter who was so shocked her mother would let us pray with her. The daughter also allowed us to pray for her own legs which had been hurting. There are many traditional healers and witch doctors in Mavhusa and a lot of fear that accompanies the things they do. But Jesus is breaking in and declaring Himself as the True Healer and we are excited to see how that will transform the traditional healing community and the whole village.
Another woman we met had a small business making and selling beer for the village. We met her as we entered her house to find a bunch of drunk customers hanging around at her home made bar. The women took us aside and told us that she desperately wanted to go to church. She told us that she was a Christian but was not allowed to go to church because of her profession of selling beer. The church gave her vegetables to sell instead, but when she was not able to make enough money to support herself and her family, they kicked her out. We spent some time ministering to this woman and explaining that the church wasn’t a building but a people. Then we told her we would come back and bring church to her!
A few days later, we returned with our bibles and shared a Jesus story with her and her family. The story we shared was Jesus’ miracle of turning water into wine. We explained that Jesus took jars used for ceremonial washing, a symbol of separation that kept the “clean” jews from the “unclean” pagans and transformed it into wine, a symbol of celebration and the lubrication of life. The woman really connected with this story as we explained to her that she follows a Christ who invites everyone to His table, even those who are considered sinners in their community.
Our little house church really turned into a church of inclusion as a man known as the village drunk came to hear the story as well. This man, who was there the first time we came, ran up and proudly presented his hand, which we had prayed over the time before and it was healed in Christ’s name! The JAM missionaries hope to continue to bring church to this woman and all the others who are not allowed inside traditional church doors to bring hope to those who need it most. We see such potential in this woman as she serves all the drunks and “sinners” of the village and can reach out to them in love just like Jesus!
One of our team members also met and ministered to a woman who was part of a ZCC church. The ZCC or Zion Christian Church, is the largest church (or cult) in South Africa. The members of this cult do not believe in Jesus. Instead they believe in praying to dead ancestors in order to get a hold of God. This cult also follows practices of healing rituals. One ritual is to draw water and then pray over it in the name of certain ancestors with the belief that it will give the water healing powers for life. As our team member spoke with this woman, she got to share the Jesus Story of when Jesus met the woman at the well. In this story, Jesus introduces the woman to alternative living water, a water far better than any well could ever hold. He was offering her Himself. We got to use this Jesus Story to explain to the ZCC woman that the only water capable of healing and new life is Jesus Christ. The ZCC members present themselves as very moralistic upstanding people. But underneath, I see a great thirst for the love only found in Jesus Christ. We believe God is still working on this woman’s heart and the hearts of all ZCC cult fellowships in South Africa.
One of the most powerful moments for me was a Jesus Story we did at a local high school. Every week, high schools in the area have an after-school church service. These services are attended by both Christians and kids who are just trying to get out of study hall, their other option for that time period. We knew this would be a cool opportunity to share the gospel. The services, called LCOs, usually involve someone getting up in front of the group and giving them a list of things they should and should not be doing as Christians. The church in South Africa struggles with legalism and moralistic focus over the transforming power of the gospel.
During one LCO this week, we got to share the Jesus Story of when Jesus cast many demons out of the crazy naked man who lived in the tombs by the cliffs and sent them into a herd of pigs. The students really seemed to resonate with the story. Africa is a very spiritual place and they understand demons much better than young people in America. But even more important, these kids got a break from hearing a legalistic sermon and were hit hard with the furious love of Jesus, who radically pursues the lowest and most pathetic humans He can find. After the story, we got into small groups and the students opened up to what they heard in the story and its affect on their own lives. A handful of students accepted Christ that day too! It didn’t take an alter call, it was simply through conversation and the realization of Christ’s love. The JAM missionaries plan to continue with the discipleship of these beautiful young people. I’m so excited for the future of these LCO communities as Jesus continues to break the chains of legalism with his transforming love.
And finally, the children! We didn’t go anywhere on our trip without at least a half dozen young kids trailing alongside of us. We joked that our mission station also functioned as a day care center and we spent so many hours simply running around and loving on the children of Mavhusa. There is a lot of child abuse and neglect that takes place here. We noticed that the kids that hung around us the most were the dirtiest and most neglected. These young kids were truly the least of these. A few times a week we would walk through the village and round up the kids for a Children’s Outreach Program at the school. We taught them bible verses and Jesus stories all week. On one of the last days, we taught the Jesus Story of when children were coming to Jesus and his disciples were pushing them away. I will never forget the look on the children’s faces when we explained that Jesus will never push them away. His arms are always open. Our message was simple. We loved the children and told them of Christ’s love. But they totally understood. I dream of a Mavhusa where these young kids grow to know and love Jesus right back and so become the spiritual leaders in their church, village and community.
The world is so desperate to know true love. The world is desperate to fall in love with Jesus. But some times the church is so busy trying to tell its attendees what they can and can’t do and consumed with other trivial matters that they completely miss its head that is Christ, the one who is even more desperate to show His people His furious love. Christ’s great desire and pleasure is to love every witch doctor, village drunk, and beer lady, every neglected child and refugee and cult leader in every village and city in the world. He pursues this mission by bringing people half way around the world, setting up circumstances, sending dreams and visions, healing hands, knees and legs and providing chicken dinners to village women. He will do whatever it takes to get His children to know Him. That’s how big is love truly is. And Jesus Christ looks absolutely beautiful in the world when His children simply run around looking like, serving like and loving like Jesus, and bringing others to the foot of the cross. That is the privilege of what we got to do these past few weeks. We didn’t build a building, run an evangelism crusade or set up a medical clinic. We simply entered into people’s homes and lives and Jesus did the rest. Because He is the ultimate pursuer and He still pursues. And that is why our journey is not yet over…
