Sent to Zambia - APR 2024

Later today (Tuesday, Apr. 16, 2024), I'll be heading to Zambia for a two-week visit. I'll fly from St. Louis to Chicago to Istanbul to Lusaka, Zambia. From there, I will take a nine-hour bus ride to Kitwe in the north. Then, a bus back to Lusaka, where I'll stay overnight before another long bus ride to Livingston in the south. Then back to Lusaka before I fly home on April 3oth. 

Due to some unfortunate circumstances, it's been a couple of years since my last visit, so I am excited and eager to get back to Zambia!

We live in a sinful world where, even among Christians, jealousy and contempt can find a foothold. Unfortunately, this has caused a delay in my visit. The story of this jealousy and its consequences began back in 2022, a short time after the CLC Mission Helpers spent a few weeks in Zambia, proclaiming the Gospel to more than a thousand children. After the Mission Helpers went back to the U.S., a few pastors in the Livingston, Zambia area were jealous of their child evangelism efforts among the Zambia-CLC (ZCLC) congregations and preaching stations in and around Livingston. They began to cause trouble for Pastor Ibrahim and the ZCLC by challenging his immigration status and spreading lies about him. 

Pastor Ibrahim is originally from Tanzania and was trained at the, then CLC-affiliated seminary, in Himo, TZ, more than ten years ago. He relocated to Zambia in 2011 and has been spreading the truths of God's saving word and training church leaders and evangelists since. 

Shortly after the trouble began in Livingston, Pastor Ibrahim decided it would be best to temporarily relocate to Lusaka with the hope and prayer that with some distance and time, the trouble would subside. Unfortunately, Satan continued his attacks against Pastor Ibrahim and the truth of God's word he was teaching. After a few months, he returned to Livingston only to find that much of the ZCLC ministry and Gospel outreach had been abandoned, and false and slanderous rumors about him had been circulating. 

Pastor Ibrahim then went back to Lusaka to work on proper immigration documentation and found that it would be necessary to return to Tanzania to get paperwork from his home country. While traveling to Tanzania, he was bitten by a scorpion and spent several weeks in the hospital. For much of that time, he was near death and remembers very little from his time there. After his discharge from the hospital, he traveled to his brother's home in Tanzania for a couple months of rest and recuperation. A few months ago, he traveled to Dar es Salaam and Dodoma in Tanzania to collect the necessary paperwork to apply for the required immigration documentation to continue the ministry in Zambia. He has now returned to Zambia and is looking forward to restarting the Gospel ministry in Zambia.

Thank the Lord for preserving Ibrahim through all of these struggles and the attacks of Satan and his proxies. And pray that the Lord will bless his efforts and provide all that is necessary to restart and reorganize the work of the ZCLC!

Ibrahim and I will have a busy couple of weeks. Our work will begin  day after my arrival when we travel by bus to the Copperbelt Province near the D.R. Congo (DRC) border to the north. We will meet up with Pastor Yumba from the DRC, where we will conduct a pastoral training seminar and an outreach seminar and have organizational meetings with the pastors and church leaders in this area. We will then take a bus back to Lusaka, where we will spend one night before taking another bus to Livingston near the Zimbabwe border to the south. While in Livingston, we will conduct training and outreach seminars and have some important meetings with the ZCLC church leaders in the area as they begin to reorganize the work of training pastors and church leaders. When our work in Livingston is finished, we will travel back to Lusaka for a weekend of worship and outreach seminars before my flight back home.

What a privilege to be able to be a part of this important work of spreading the truths of God's saving word!!

Thank the Lord for restoring Pastor Ibrahim back to good health and for giving him the zeal and commitment to return to Zambia and get back to the Gospel ministry there. 

Ask the Lord to provide abundant love, wisdom, patience, provision, protection, and blessings on all that is necessary during this visit so that His will be done and the work of spreading the Gospel in Zambia may continue in a way that is pleasing to Him and brings honor and glory to His name!

Please also pray for my wife Beth as she takes care of her parents, who are both dealing with serious health issues and are in need of lots of care and prayers.