GIVING UP THE BOTTLE

For those of you who don't read ALife, here is an article Debbi wrote which appears in the current issue, concerning one of our recent converts in our church plant in Ouaga 2000:

GIVING UP THE BOTTLE
But these spirits weren’t for drinking!

God has been doing amazing things in the Ouaga 2000 neighborhood of Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, where we are planting a church. Souls are added to the Kingdom on a regular basis, and people are being delivered from the power of sorcery.


Gildas, a young Congolese man, visited the church for the first time in August. A musician and an actor, he came to Burkina with a band two years ago looking for work. He is an accomplished drummer, and with Gildas playing the djembe for our Sunday morning services, our worship is livelier than ever.

When my husband, Steve, announced that we would be holding our first baptism service in September, Gildas immediately signed up and began attending the classes. The Sunday before the baptism, he arrived very early for the service so we sat down with him to talk. When we asked how he had met the Lord, Gildas told us that he had never asked Christ into his life but that he was ready! The three of us bowed our heads as Gildas asked forgiveness for his sins and invited Jesus to be his Lord and Savior. As Steve prayed that Gildas be filled with the Holy Spirit, our new brother began sneezing, coughing and making strange noises. We knew that unclean spirits were leaving him as the Holy Spirit came into his life.

At the end of the prayer, Gildas said, “I need to confess something.” The presence of the Holy Spirit in his life brought immediate conviction of sin! Gildas told us that when he first came to Burkina, he was told to go to a powerful witchdoctor who could help him to have a successful musical career. Gildas was given a bottle of liquid that he was to smear on his face before each performance while reciting a specific incantation. He knew that in taking this bottle and using it, he had made a pact with the devil. He was extremely distressed by what he had done.


We told Gildas to come back the next day with the bottle, and we would be his witnesses in breaking the pact he had made with the enemy and renouncing the effects of this sin. It was with great joy that Gildas poured the liquid onto the ground in our front yard and threw away the bottle! He prayed a beautiful prayer renouncing the sins of his ancestors, repenting for serving the devil and asking Christ to be his Master. We told him that from that day on, it would be God who would give him success in his work, and we prayed a blessing to that effect.

The day of Gildas’ baptism he received a phone message telling him that he had landed a major part in a film that is being produced in Ouagadougou. The following week he received another call from an international percussion group he had auditioned for—they wanted him to join. He was ecstatic and affirmed that these were signs his success now comes from God! Gildas has been transformed by the power of the Living Christ—his face glows, and he is filled with incredible joy. Praise God!

Nine Days by the Atlantic Ocean

Yes, it was a far cry from the Sahel where I live. Not that I’m putting the Sahel down, mind you, because it’s got a beauty of its own and I love it. But being by the ocean was a special treat for this desert gal. Especially since my sister and her family now reside in Dakar!



Each year I make the trek to various countries where the C&MA has workers in order to check out educational options for our TCKs and give encouragement and advice where needed to families who often lack resources and input. This time I visited with families and personnel at Dakar Academy, our regional boarding school, as well as Senegal field families in both Dakar and St. Louis.

At my stage in life, I do not easily leave my husband of 30 years, my comfortable bed, and the classes that I regularly teach without a good reason. Delayed flights, ancient planes, and long layovers in uncomfortable airports are no longer in the category of “adventures” that I was so fond of in my younger years. Nowadays I’d prefer to stay in my comfortable routine doing what I love best: my ministries of teaching and hospitality.


My trip to Senegal, however, is a case in point of why I step outside of my comfort zone in order to be a regional educational consultant. On this young field we have several brand new families who have 13 (almost 14) children between them and are studying the difficult Wolof language while at the same time trying to ensure that their children receive the best possible education. In addition, there are experienced families like my sister and her family (the Joel Bubnas) who are trying an out-of-the-box educational option (bilingual school) in order to ensure that their daughters become fluent French speakers.


All of these families welcomed my input and suggestions on how to maximize the educational options they have chosen for their children. One family is home schooling and the challenge for that family is to adequately expose their children to Senegalese culture and languages. Other families are using a variety of local and French schooling options. For these families, integrating biblical knowledge and worldview is a challenge. In a country where the kids do not have access to church children’s programs, this is an issue that requires creative solutions.

I certainly do not have all the answers for the questions that these families ask, but I can provide resources, lend a listening ear, and be an advocate for them. It is rewarding to come away from this kind of trip feeling that I made a difference in some small way in a new family’s adjustment to the place to which God has called them!

Penetrating the Darkness at Léry

As you know, I make trips from time to time to remote Dafing villages to take the Gospel to places where it has not gone before. I take a team of Dafing pastors/evangelists with me each time. This time, we spent 5 days in the village of Léry, an unreached Dafing village at the head of the Mouhoun river. The National church's District leadership targeted this village as a “beachhead” to launch their outreach to the region and invited our team to come give them a hand. This village and the surrounding area has been historically a “dark” region, resistant to any form of Christianity. One might ask what we did all that time: how does one “penetrate the darkness” with the Gospel?


As one might expect, the evenings were filled with what one might describe as a traditional open-air campaign: singing, preaching and the projection of an evangelistic film.





Daytime activities vary. We usually start with a Prayer Walk where we walk around the whole village, claiming every inch of ground our feet have tread for Christ, and putting the powers of darkness on notice that their time of uncontested control over the lives of this population is finished (Eph. 3:10) We stop and pray at certain strategic sites: a place where sacrifices are done, to pray for a particular neighborhood, or anywhere the Lord my show us. We pray that the powers operating in that area will no longer be effective and that the blindness keeping people from hearing and understanding the Gospel be lifted (2 Cor. 4:4 ).


Sometimes we do door-to-door evangelism, sometimes we just mill around the village striking up conversations with people. Sometimes we go and just offer to pray for people, without directly trying to give them any Gospel presentation. Often “seekers” come to us chat or ask for prayer so we often split up into teams - some stay at the house to talk to seekers while others go out into the village.

One little boy about 10 years of age was healed. We found him lying on a mat under the shade of a tree in the courtyard. His mother said his stomach hurt and he was vomiting a yellow liquid. We prayed for him and a few hours later we saw him up playing with his friends.

Two “seekers” came and asked for prayer - they were actually people who'd prayed to receive Christ years before and fell away. We led them through prays of repentance and encouraged them.

Other than that, we saw no tangible fruit for our efforts in Léry but we are not discouraged. This is typical when going into a new area. In the past, we have seen the Lord blast a village wide open through power encounter and healings. We have also seen Him work in slower ways, as in Léry, where we faithfully plant the seed - the fruit will come later. God said his word would not return to him void (Isaiah 55.11).

Pray for the people of Léry that the seeds planted will come to fruition and for the the pastor laboring to see a harvest in that village.

Non-stop Events

If anything characterizes our lives right now, it’s a lack of routine! We seem to be going from one big event to the next with very little downtime in between.

Last week found us both absent from home – Steve off in a remote bush village for an evangelistic campaign, and me at the first conference of the Burkina chapter of ACSI (Alliance des Etablissements Scolaire Eangélique de Burkina Faso is the name of our newly-formed association). On Wednesday I take off for nine days in Senegal to visit missionary families in my educational consulting role.


Steve will tell you about his campaign later on, but I just wanted to post some photos and tell a little about the amazing conference I was privileged to have a part in.

I have the distinct honor of being the only non-Burkinabe member of the national committee for AESEB. Working with these highly qualified educators from several different denominations has been such a joy and privilege for me. Our committee has spent the past several months preparing for this conference, which brought together church leaders and Christian school directors from across the country. ACSI sent us four outstanding speakers – two from France, one from South Africa, and one from the U.S. They are all major players in developing the Christian school movement on the African continent. This movement is gaining great momentum and promises to be a very strategic tool for reaching the present generation of Africans for Jesus Christ!

The conference was held at a center here in Ouaga and over 100 participants attended. We were challenged by the realities of many of Africa’s children being “at risk” because of poverty, war, and disease, but also because of false religions that are trying to win their hearts and minds. It is very exciting to see Burkinabe educators and church leaders catch the vision for reaching children through Christian schools and begin to understand what a truly Christian education looks like.


I’m certain that you will hear more from me in the months and years to come about what God is doing in Christian education here in Burkina and around the continent. Many things are coming together at this point in history to bring Christian schools to the forefront of reaching this continent with the Gospel. I feel so blessed to have a small part in what is happening!

PVC Mania

Believe it or not, these are NOT entries for an instructables contest - just a home-made projector/sound equipment stand and screen for our upcoming evangelism campaign in the Dafing village of Léry. We try to keep it as simple and stream-lined as possible. Sometimes the kind of equipment we need or want is not readily available and thus we resort to do-it-yourself type projects, compliments of Clouser Slap-dab Engineering, Inc.

Getting ready for an evangelism campaign requires attention to a lot of details: equipment, logistics, personnel, food, program, etc. As I am sure you know, the most important preparation prior to any campaign is prayer. Someone has said that the real battle is fought and won in prayer; ministry (in this case, evangelism) is just picking up the spoils of battle.

We covet your participation in this campaign through prayer. Over the years we have seen remarkable fruit in our campaigns including miraculous healings, dramatic power encounter and conversions in normally hard places. There have also been times when we saw pitifully little fruit in what had seemed to be promising or “fertile” areas and even spiritual and physical attacks on family and team members when there was a lack of sufficient prayer.

Our 6-member team consists of 3 Dafing Pastor/evangelists, one student-pastor, a pastor's son who is going along as our drummer/photographer and one missionary (me). So, please help us and pray for our campaign in Léry from October 6-11:

1) Pray that the god of this age be bound and the blindness of unbelievers lifted so that
they can see the light of the Gospel (2 Co. 4:4)
2) Pray for God's anointing, wisdom and power as we speak to people, pray with people and continually seek the Lord's leading in the course of the campaign
3) Pray that the name of the Lord Jesus Christ will be honored and glorified through the preaching of His Word and through healing in His name
4) Pray that we will unshakably stand on his promise that he has given authority over all the power of the enemy (Luke 10.19).
5) Pray that the Lord will give us an open door, that many will believe and be saved
6) Pray for safety and for good health for the team and their families

On our way out to Léry, we will spend a night in the Nunuma village of Ouézara and show the Jesus film there. This village has a few believers and a small church but the majority have yet to believe in Jesus. The Nunuma are another unreached people group in Burkina Faso that have shown some response in just the last few years. We have been reaching them through the ministry of our neighboring Dafing churches. Pray that many Nunuma will come to Christ on that evening, Oct. 6th.

REACHING YOUTH

God is at work among the youth of our neighborhood! As Phase One of construction on our Center youth room comes to an end, we are so thankful that this room will be one more way for us to continue working alongside the Holy Spirit as He draws more and more young people to himself!

Check out our beautiful youth room – the paint is on the walls, the electrical and plumbing fixtures are installed, and now we are ready to move on to Phase Two as finances come in. That will have to wait until after our home assignment now. Our minds are filled with possibilities for how this room can be used to draw young people to Jesus Christ.

A week ago yesterday we baptized 13 new converts at the pool of one of our church members. The presence of the Holy Spirit was so very real as each young person gave testimony of their faith in Christ and their decision to follow Him. The singing and dancing around the pool went on for a long time afterwards as we all expressed our joy!

Yesterday these newly-baptized believers took communion for the first time in our morning service. Steve preached a message on the atonement and again, the Holy Spirit’s presence in our midst was palpable. Several times cheers and whoops of joy broke out in the group. There is a wonderful feeling of expectancy in our midst as we see young people giving their lives to Christ on a regular basis and then being discipled in their faith.

God has allowed us to be physically a part of what He’s doing in this corner of our globe. We are well aware, however, that we represent a whole army of believers who are part of our “team.” We are so grateful for those who gave the funds for us to complete Phase One of our youth room and for those who give so that we can be here ministering in Christ’s name. We wish each of you could be here with us to share our joy at what the Lord is doing!

A White Harvest Field

God is doing amazing things here in Ouagadougou!

When we first began planting a church in the Ouaga 2000 neighborhood of this capital city at the beginning of this year, we had no idea that we had been sent by God to a very “white harvest field”. Our prayer from the beginning was that Christ’s ministry of preaching the Good News, healing the sick, and delivering the oppressed would be manifest in our ministry here. God has answered in ways that have surpassed our expectations! Please praise Him with us for these miracles:


1) Yesterday we baptized 13 new believers! Most of them have come to Christ since our church first began meeting last spring. We will not soon forget the look of joy on their faces and the sense of the Holy Spirit’s presence in our midst as we all danced and sang with joy afterwards.

2) Several young men have recently come to Christ who were strongly entrenched in the occult. We have had the privilege of walking them through the steps of deliverance and have seen the Holy Spirit work in a powerful way to take over territory that once belonged to the enemy. Praise the name of Jesus!

3) Our Thursday evening youth Bible study has been growing and we are seeing new believers growing in their faith. One of our young people was unjustly arrested and thrown in jail for 5 days last week. Though the conditions were deplorable and it was a huge trial for him, we thank God that he was released and that the experience drew him closer in his walk with Christ.

Some of you are aware that we will be leaving for a six-month home assignment just before Christmas. We are extremely anxious to be reunited with our children and our extended families. The timing is perfect as our first grandchild is due to be born in January! We would ask you to pray for all that will be transpiring in these coming months before our departure. Here are some specifics for your intercession:

1) Debbi is on the organizational committee for a large ACSI Christian school conference that is being held Oct. 6-9 here in Ouaga. She also has three trips to make this fall in her role as regional educational consultant (Senegal, Mali, and Guinea). Pray for health and strength for these activities that are added on to her regular ministries.

2) Steve is in the process of organizing an evangelism campaign for the beginning of October in an unreached area of Burkina. Pray for him and his team as they make plans, and for a harvest of souls in the village of Léry.

3) Pray for God’s provision for shepherding our young community of believers here in Ouaga 2000 during our home assignment. We aren’t sure how all of the pastoral responsibilities will be cared for, but we know that God will provide for His Church.

Many of you have heard about the recent floods that have wreaked havoc here in Ouaga, knocking down thousands of mud-brick houses and resulting in 150,000 people being homeless. City-wide infrastructures such as bridges, electricity, and water have been affected in many sectors, and relief efforts have kicked into high gear on the part of the government and many non-governmental agencies. The C&MA is joining CAMA Services in helping to provide food and clothing for the homeless. If you would like to be a part of this effort, you can send your tax-free donation to CAMA Services at the C&MA address in Colorado Springs. Be sure to mark your gift “Ouagadougou flood relief”.

Since we live in a new neighborhood of the city, we were not personally affected by the devastation, but we certainly know many people who were. They are in need of prayer for God’s provision at this difficult time.

With love in Christ,
Steve and Debbi