Together 4 The City. What a great name for what turned out to be an incredible event for the city of Bulawayo. It was organized by one of the local churches with invitations going out to all the churches in the city if they wanted to participate. 8 local churches accepted the “challenge” as it was held on Sunday morning which of course meant giving up a Sunday service at the “home” church. Michael Eaton, an author and pastor from Nairobi, Kenya was in town as the main speaker for the event and he delivered a great message entitled “The 3 Things The Blood Of Jesus Will Do”. Great message, great venue,  great turnout of people; however to me the most amazing part of the whole day was the spirit of unity that was so pervasive one could almost cut it with a knife. I mean think about it, 8 different churches coming together in one unified day of praise and worship to the same God we all worship, I believe the Lord was pleased. This is what heaven will look like. I have never before seen in one place together such a diverse group of followers of Jesus, coming together to give Him the praise and glory He deserves. Young and old, black, white and everything in between, Shona and Ndebele, Baptist and Pentecostal, ALL of God’s people were represented. I truly believe this is the beginning of something new in this city. Lets pray for unity in the body of Christ worldwide. After all, it’s not about our identity but rather HIS identity as author and creator of the universe…..Isn’t it?  

29 July   Not sure why the text never showed up when I posted this…here it is.

James 1:27-2:1

 27 Pure and genuine religion in the sight of God the Father means caring for orphans and widows in their distress and refusing to let the world corrupt you.

Yesterday was just another one of those days that I was reminded how much fun it really is to serve Gods people through Celebration Church. Obviously I am a huge believer in the power of the local church in the community as we band together in the name of Jesus and reach out to the lost and hurting, empowering everyone to put God first and foremost in their lives. In addition to feeding and ministering to the children we also do our best to lift up and empower the widows in the community.

Yesterday afternoon was our monthly Widows Tea, when we gather all the ladies together for tea and cakes as well as some fellowship time, testimonies  and sharing from the Word  by one of the Pastors. We recruit all of our staff pastors to come and serve the ladies just as a small gesture to honor them. Yesterday brought 30 of these incredible ladies, many of whom are real heros in my eyes. Losing a husband is a devastating situation no matter where you live but in Africa the culture can make these situations nearly unbearable. Not only do many of these ladies have little or no skills, they may also very likely be infected with HIV/AIDS brought home to them by their late husbands. These women have little and no “rights” in this culture and many times the husband family will arrive to take all the possessions as well as the home, throwing the wife and children out into the streets.

Listening to the testimonies from a couple of the ladies yesterday made me realize just how thankful to God I need to be each and every day for all He has done. One of the ladies talked about how grateful she was to God for bringing new customers for her business. Now mind you, her business is selling worms, spending her days digging to obtain her “product” and she was genuinely happy that she was able to make her living for her and her children in this manner. Another of the ladies was simply thankful to have Celebration Church in the lives of her and her children and  without that love and support she just could not have made it through. Lets remember  today and every day to be thankful for all that the Lord has done for us. No matter how bad your situation may seem to be, there’s always someone else who is likely in worse shape than you. Reach out beyond yourself today. You will be amazed at how very small your problems will seem when you stretch out a hand to another.  What an awesome God we serve. 

The Alpha and Omega, Savior, the Beginning and the End, the Lamb of God, Creator, Deliverer, Author of Life, Chief Cornerstone, Good Shepherd,  King of Kings, Lord of Lords, Mighty God, Light of the World, Redeemer, The Way, The Truth and the Life, True Vine, High Priest, Immanuel, I Am, Redeemer, Son of God, Son of Man, Lord of All and most of all Lord of my Life.

Ever wondered what life would be like if you had never come to know Jesus? For me the unequivocal answer is quite simple. My life would have surely ended and I would be stuck in a very warm climate for eternity. Ahhh, but now I live a life that is meaningful and rewarding, one that transverses eternity. I have learned how to love for the first time in my life, I have learned how to live at peace with myself, to finally be comfortable in my own skin, knowing that the Creator of the universe loves me unconditionally and cares about me. I can have a meaningful relationship with Him, knowing that I can always pour out my heart in sorrow and distress, and better yet that I can share my happiness and joy with Him. He has filled that overwhelming emptiness in my heart that drugs, alcohol, relationships or money were never able to fill. He is a true friend who never complains and always has just the right answer, whether I want to hear it or not. Praise the name of Jesus. I am so glad you are in my life.

Not only do I know that I know Jesus is real in my life, but I am also blessed to see Him become real in so many other lives. Day in and day out here in Africa I can witness first hand His miracle working, life transforming power. I see it in the eyes of the hungry child for whom God provides their only meal for the day, the one that would very likely starve to death were it not for this food. I see it in the eyes of the disease wracked human beings who are slowly dying from HIV/AIDS. I see it in the eyes of the teenagers and young adults who only ever knew of a hopeless future before we were able to show them the love of Jesus. There is just no greater joy than to see Jesus bring hope where there was only hopelessness, to see Him bring love where there was nothing but hatred and contempt and to see joy and peace where there was only discouragement and frustration.

What an awesome God we serve.  Take a moment today to give Him thanks for the incredible love, grace and mercy He pours out on each and every one of us….His precious children.  

Sometimes I think we may occasionally lose sight of  what we are REALLY doing in this thing we call church. We run around and struggle to make things just perfect, and well we should. We serve a God of excellence and we should never settle for mediocrity as we introduce people to Him. But at the end of the day, its all about changed lives, healed hearts, minds and love unconditional as people give their heart to Jesus. We had an incredible time at all 20 of our services this weekend. But despite a few meltdowns, Jesus showed up in a big way. As I was privileged to see 17 more people give their lives to Jesus today, along with 118 more last week at our outreaches, I am reminded of the incredible love and mercy that Jesus has shown to me, absolutely none of which I deserved. Each and every altar call this weekend brought me to my knees as we were able to usher new souls into the Kingdom. Thank you Holy Spirit for reminding me of why we do what we do. 

The countdown starts tomorrow for our outreaches in Mawabeni and Esibomvu. Please pray for God to show up in a big way here next week.  Tomorrow we will be holding some training sessions for our workers and leaders from these locations. I will be sharing a little bit about servant leadership/servants heart with our leaders tomorrow. After some research and study, and talking to some people who are a whole lot smarter than me, here’s some of the things I came up with.

In the Bible, greatness is defined by servanthood. Having the heart of a servant is so important. Many times our servants heart can reveal the depth of our maturity. I believe we can serve in a church for a lifetime without ever being a servant……That’s a radical statement, but think about it. In order to really be a servant we must have a servants heart. Here are some points to think about:

1.Servants make themselves available

2 Tim 2:3-4

 4 And as Christ’s soldier, do not let yourself become tied up in the affairs of this life, for then you cannot satisfy the one who has enlisted you in his army

NLT

Do you welcome interruptions as possible divine appointments?

2.Servants pay attention to needs.

Gal 6:10

10 Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers.

NIV

Seize the opportunity. Were there any opportunities you missed this week?

3.Servants do EVERY task with equal dedication

Col 3:23

23 Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men,

NIV

There is only one issue here….”Does it need to be done?”

4.Servants do the best with what they have

Eccl 11:4

4 If you wait for perfect conditions, you will never get anything done.  

TLB

Never have I seen this better illustrated than I have in Africa. What has God put in your hand today?

5. Servants maintain a low profile.

1 Peter 5:5

And all of you must put on the apron of humility, to serve one another; for the scripture says, “God resists the proud, but shows favor to the humble.”

TEV

Self promotion and servanthood don’t mix.

So lets all stand in there for Jesus and have the heart of a servant in everything we do.

1 Cor 15:58

58 So, my dear brothers and sisters, be strong and steady, always enthusiastic about the Lord’s work, for you know that nothing you do for the Lord is ever useless.

NLT

Thanks for your love, support and prayers.  Why the flower pictures? I could say I just wanted to share some of the beauty of Africa with you and that is true, however the simple truth is I had no pictures to go along with the servanthood topic!!!!

So what in the world is a Mawabeni and an Esibomvu? These would be the 2 newest Celebration Church locations in Zimbabwe. Tell me those aren’t cool names for a church!!  Esibomvu is my favorite, just kinda’ rolls off your tongue. Having 4 syllables you can say it all kinds of different ways. Read on when you get done having fun with this name!!!

We began these 2 locations at the beginning of February in an area of Zimbabwe designated as a “growth point”. I was able to make my first visit to these 2 locations last week to spend some time with the pastors and core leaders of these new churches. What an awesome group of people to help grow Jesus’s  church in Zimbabwe. It’s a rural type environment here, guess I would define it as the next step from a village setting. There is a gas station along with a few small businesses on the main “street”, which is really a very bumpy dirt road. They are beginning to clear an area for a township to be built and there are also schools which we are now using for Sunday services. I asked how many people were living in the immediate surrounding area and was amazed to be told there are around 30,000 living in this area. What a great place to have church. What we have begun to offer in Celebration services seems to be catching on. Those I got to spend time with here say they have never been to church like this!!!  Praise the Lord that we are able to show Jesus to His people in Mawebeni and Esibomvu.

Pictures above are of Pastors Albert Ncube and Andrew Sibanda as well as some of their family and leaders. Asyou can see they are all just fired up about serving Jesus in Zimbabwe. We nearly had a church service right in their front yard. The next step here is to make application for a parcel of property where we can erect another Celebration church home. Please pray for favor as well as resources to allow us to continue to expand the Kingdom.  

A busy week it has been for our Celebration team in Zimbabwe. 6 days of outreach followed up with water baptisms this past weekend.  Monday through Wed was spent at Sauerstown (a high density, low income suburb of Bulawayo), then Thursday through Saturday outreaches were at How Mine. This is actually the site of a gold mining operation which has not been in operation for nearly a year, although with the introduction of foreign currency  should be back in operation soon.How Mine is a high density community made up of the mine workers and their families who of course have not been paid since the shutdown of operations. Most are surviving by subsistence farming where they are able. We began feeding children in this area late last year when we discovered there were children starving to death in the community and Celebration How Mine campus quickly sprung up from our feeding effort.

Here are some quick statistics from the week.

-Sauerstown saw over 3000 in attendance at the outreach meetings. 98 new believers were added to the Kingdom!!

-How Mine reported over 2000 in attendance, with 69 giving their life to Jesus for the first time. How Mine also has a heavy populated of Muslims, of which we had one give his life to Jesus!!!

Many hundreds more made a decision to rededicate their lives to Christ as hearts and lives were changed in response to the Word. We have begun using our 20 ton truck (with sides opened up) as a mobile stage from which to conduct our worship and services. It’s a bit like a mobile evangelism unit which will serve us well by allowing us to travel to an ever widening group of locations scattered across the southern half of Zimbabwe.

We finished up the week with water baptism services in Bulawayo and How Mine where we were privileged to baptize many of the new believers. Here are some pictures of some of the baptisms as well as a shot of our “mobile evangelism stage”. (sorry, lighting was not good enough to get any decent pics of the outreaches as we held them in the evening)  Please continue to pray for our staff and pastors as God continues to stretch and mold an ever growing work for His kingdom in Zimbabwe. 

So tomorrow closes one chapter and begins another as I pack up and head for Zimbabwe to begin working full time with Pastor Dixon Changara at Celebration Zimbabwe. I am super excited to finally be getting into Zim on a full time basis. I am truly humbled to be able to partner with God and the awesome family in the U.S., Swaziland and now Zimbabwe as we continue to roll back the darkness in Africa with the light of King Jesus. The excitement does not come without a bit of apprehension as I step into a new environment that most people are moving out of rather than moving in to. What I do know is God is moving in Zimbabwe and if that’s where He is that’s where I want to be. Explosive growth continues to be the norm with 2 more locations opening this month, bringing the total to 16 points of light in a country that has been enveloped in darkness for far too long. My prayer is that I am up to the task, to be ready for whatever God needs to have done for those that “are not here” yet. There’s no greater joy in my life than to see broken lives transformed by the saving grace of our Lord Jesus.

My short time here in Swaziland has been another life changing experience, another chapter of God’s work of art that is my life. I’ve been able to reconnect with some old friends as well as make a whole lot of new ones. My last service at HPC Swaziland was a grand experience as we held a baptism service, sealing the inward commitment that has changed so many lives here already. Let the heavens rejoice and the demons tremble. Jesus is on the move in Africa.

I suppose it’s time for a Zimbabwe update. That IS the reason I am in Africa in the first place, however I am so enjoying my time here in Swaziland with the Childrens Cup family. What a great bunch of people to do life with!! Pastor Ben and some of the staff here recently returned from a trip to Zimbabwe and it does not appear that the food shortage situation is getting any better. In visiting the grocery stores the only items on the shelves were sugar and condoms. Yes, an ENTIRE grocery store with totally empty shelves, nothing but sugar and condoms.  I’m not even gonna try to figure out if there is some significance to just those 2 items, I’m sure there is a sermon in there somewhere!!  I will leave it to your imagination. Please let me know if anyone gets revelation on this one.

One thing that has not changed is the incredible power and presence of God that is all over the work that Pastor Dixon and the Celebration Zimbabwe team are doing there. I did not make this trip so as not to endanger my permanent residence application process but it is obvious that the hope and love I saw on my last visit there continues to abound and overflow. Even in the midst of a seemingly hopeless situation God is showing himself strong. Attendance this past weekend was over 1400 across all the locations in Zimbabwe. What an awesome testimony to the power that is in the simple message of the Gospel as we present it in an atmosphere of love and acceptance. Take a look at the pictures. These are from our services in Masvingo as well as some of the children that are being fed in Chambuta. I stand in amazement at the work God is doing in and through Celebration Church all over the world. I am excited and ready to go to Zimbabwe. Everything seems to be falling into place. All of my papers (and there were a LOT of them) have been accepted and certified by the Chief of immigration in Bulawayo. Final approval from Harare is all that we are awaiting. Thank you Lord for a relatively smooth process up to this point. I know that You continue to walk before us and prepare the way.

OK I am one week away from leaving the good ol U.S.A. to go and live in Africa for ????  I really don’t know how long God is gonna keep me in Africa but I’m ready for whatever He has for me. All i know is God is good and He  ALWAYS has my back.   

Isa 41:9-10
9 I took you from the ends of the earth,
from its farthest corners I called you.
I said, ‘You are my servant’;
I have chosen you and have not rejected you.
10 So do not fear, for I am with you;
do not be dismayed, for I am your God.
I will strengthen you and help you;
I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.
NIV