Tenga

While we try to write on more positive subjects, perhaps it isn't completely fair to not mention some of the more difficult sides of serving here. Today was one of those days - while I enjoyed the day immensely, just being with my Mozambican brothers, it was a very difficult subject.

The church at Tenga was built through our church planting program somewhere around 2006. But, while there have been many blessings from the work there, there is also a very sad side. Ann and I actually participated on a prayer walk around the property with a prayer team in about 2004, while arrangements were being made to purchase the land. Evangelism efforts in the area were successful and a church was started and built by teams. A pastor funded by our ECC program moved to the area and began to build the work in the area. A well was put in, but the water was salty and it never worked right as the water recharge rate was too slow. The pastor left the work after a few months, and the denomination was never able to put someone else in that area. The denomination made a good effort to send people to the church on Sundays but it was expensive from a transportation standpoint and was not sustainable. After a while, the visits became less and less. Several evangelism campaigns were done by local churches at the church property with good responses, but no leader for this small church ever emerged.


Last Friday night, a terrible wind-storm passed through the area. On Saturday, we learned that the church was completely blown down. Two Pastors went there Saturday and confirmed that the church was not recoverable. Today, I went up to the area with two of our National pastors. We rented a truck at a local market and drove up to the church. The metal roofing material, which is highly valued here, had been gathered by a church member. The wonderful roof trusses had been broken apart to salvage the wood. The doors had disappeared and no one knows exactly what happened to them.

We talked with the government official in the area and some of the church families. The question was 'when are you going to rebuilt the church for us?' Of course, we have no answer and it is heart breaking. At the same time, the community never took responsibility for the structure either and we lacked the resources to put someone there to grow the work. A sad story all the way around. We fret greatly about situations like this, asking many very hard questions of ourselves.

We loaded up the materials on the truck and took them to the Khongolote ministry center where the materials would be guarded and kept until the denomination decides the next step. For me, I find it very difficult to look the people of Tenga in the eye, feeling like we have all let this community down.

Practically, the sturdy support posts were eaten by the voracious termites in the area, such that the posts were no longer solid at ground level. The extremely well-made but heavy trusses and roofing material caused instability when the posts began to fail, and add a heavy wind storm, and it crashed to the ground. The termite damage was truly awesome and what was especially interesting is that one post was made from what is called 'iron wood'. The termites didn't touch that post but all the rest were like powder.

I do want to emphasize that this was a very well-built church. It was designed to be expanded, to fill in with block walls someday, very well constructed, and located on a beautiful piece of property, albeit in an area know for its termites. The posts were treated and reasonable precautions taken. But, time has a way of marching on....

So, we all cried much about this work today. It is not a success story. It points to the great importance on training others to train others. It is a case study on what happens without leadership and to us screams out the importance of our seminary training program to provide new leaders and the importance of the training part of our church multiplication program. Planting churches is one thing, but building them up is quite another. We need both. If we plant them and five years later they are gone, physically and spiritually, what have we really accomplished? We need to ask the hard questions.

On the other hand, it was a blessed day for me to spend the entire day with two of our church leaders (Daniel and Abel), just talking, sharing, and talking about all kinds of things. I really enjoyed being with them and we cried together about this situation.

Abel called just a few minutes ago to advise me that his motorcycle stopped working on the way home. He pushed it about 10 miles to his home in the dark. This makes me sad as well. He takes very good care of it and uses it extensively, but after 10,000 km, it seems to be reaching the end of its usefulnes, which is very disappointing. It is a Chinese brand as they are affordable here, as compared to Honda's for example, which are over the top price-wise. This weighs heavy on me as well, as we have seen this simple tool really expand what he can accomplish in a given day - increase his effectiveness in ministry literally by factors. So, we will see what the repair shop says but it sounded serious from his description. He should have called, I pulled the loaded truck out of the deep sand twice today, we could have pulled the motorcycle home probably also although that is a scary thought on the streets of Maputo.

With much love.

Dave

"Therefore comfort each other and edify one another, just as you also are doing." 1 Th 5:11