Hi everyone!!! We have been doing outreach for the past week, which means that you go to a small village and just talk with people. Here hospitality is all they know, they invited you in their homes no matter how small often they will go buy you something like soda to serve you. They are so kind. Once we get talking they ask why we are here and then we answer with ‘we want to learn and share the love of God with you!’ we always ask if they will teach us how to wash cloths or dishes, maybe sweep. The key i’ve learned is to enter ready to learn.
Today we met a witch doctor, but that term is offensive so they are called traditional healers or sangma
The man we met is named Alfrode he grew up in the church, and says he is a christian sangoma. He was very eager to answer any questions we had, so i asked how do you become this, he answered “it is a calling before you are even born the ancestors have picked you. If you hear them calling you to do this and you refuse the ancestors will come after your family and kill everyone but you, they will have others drag you to their ‘church’ where the ancestors live.’ He believes God as all power, and he has given it to the ancestors and they have given it to him. I asked if he believed in Jesus, in Jesus coming to earth he replied saying ‘i was not there so i can not say he has come or he hasn’t’ then i asked if he thought God created the earth and he said ‘God created everything, everything’ I was confused by this because i couldn’t figure out if he had to see to believe but he wasn’t there when God created the world and he believes that. Most sangomas (witch doctors) are known by what they wear-bracelets and necklaces this man only had 6 or 7 bracelets and that is still a lot for this country. Four of them where goat skin, after you have had an apprentice and they are ready to become their own it’s a ritual they take a goat to offer to the ancestors, then they each take parts of the skin to wear as a form of connection. The other bracelet is beads with spine bones attached, very long and rapped around much of his arm, he explained this as the beaded cross necklace that catholics pray with. Then there are one or two metal bracelets and these allow his hands to have power, if he takes it off his hand will no longer work, and if he leaves it off for a day or so his hand will become parelised.
This helped me understand some other believes in these villages. One I have noticed that many baby’s and older men and women wear string, maybe around their neck or wrist or leg anywhere really. I asked what it was, and they told me that when they have pain they go to a church and pray over this string to heal the pain. When i asked why not just pray for the pain directly they said that God needs help, that he has so many people to look after that we must help him. I did not know what to say to this, she grew up believing this and she was very strong in this belief. There was no changing her mind right there, but ask we talked with her I new that a seed was being planted and praise Jesus because it all starts somewhere.
