by Joy Casey
What joy it was to worship our Savior with the people of this village I will call “G”! I know God’s heart was full of joy as He witnessed the people abandoning themselves in worship with only a drumbeat and hand clapping joining voices raised in grateful song.
The leader of our evangelists, Pastor Zerihun, brought a message from Ephesians, and I was delighted to see my friend engage the people with God’s word.
After he preached, three women came forward to dedicate themselves to the one and only Savior, Jesus of Nazareth. There was much rejoicing … both in “G” and in heaven!
After church, I had a good time with some of the evangelists serving in the area. This has been a hard year as well as a good year. The hard part has been the severe drought affecting this region. Each of the evangelists are sponsored by a U.S. family but the amount of support is not enough to provide everything for their families so they need to farm or raise livestock to supplement. This year, everyone’s crops burned up and cattle died due to lack of food and water. The only thing keeping starvation from their door was the monthly support of their sponsors. There aren’t words to express how grateful the men are for that help! It has also been a good year because they have witnessed to many people and have had the privilege of leading many to Christ. This area is considered engaged but unreached, as less than 1% of the population are Christ-followers.
One nearby village to “G” has 88 converts and is growing. Church is held in a missionary’s house with a built on lean-to. It is not ideal and the missionary’s wife has been quite ill this year and really wants church somewhere else. There is a need to build a worship center in this village that will be a permanent place to pray, worship and study God’s word. In the M*sl*m culture, a worship center holds a place of high value. One of the statements evangelists hear all the time is, “You Christians have no place to pray…” and Christianity without a church has no credible reputation here. House churches are okay and we could expand into more house churches, but with most everyone a relatively new Christian there are only 1 or 2 people equipped to teach the Bible.
If you are interested in helping financially to build a church we would love to hear from you! Contact us at info@NewLifeEthiopia.org