I have spent my whole life in the church. There have been numerous Sundays when in a sermon there has been reference to parts of the world where people have never heard the gospel. Of course, I believed that and conceptually thought that I grasped what that meant. But, from spending a month in the “bush” of Mozambique in Southern Africa, I discovered that I had no clue what that really meant. I think it is one of those things that must be experienced to really understand.
We arrived in Machanga, Mozambique not really knowing the situation we were going into. There was a small Christian church there and we were tenting outside the church. Throughout our time there, God repeatedly brought me to this passage in Romans 10:14-15.
“How then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? And how can they preach unless they are sent? As it is written, ‘How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!'”
This is not a passage that was foreign to me. In fact, I had read it many times before. But, its meaning came to life to me this month. The situation we were in this month was different than I was used to. The people in the church did not have Bibles and even if they did, they cannot read. They were fully reliant on the pastor to teach them anything and everything there is to know about Jesus and what it means to be a Christian. I made the great mistake of assuming that because we were at a “Christian” church that the majority of the members were Christian or at least knew what it meant to be a Christian. I thought that as a member of the church that you surely knew that being a Christian meant having a personal relationship with Christ. I was wrong, terribly wrong.
Needless to say, I was dumbfounded when we had an altar call only a few nights before we left the area and not only did all of the members of the church come forward, but the pastor himself came forward to accept Christ into his life as well. Wow! What is going on here?!? What do you do with that information?
I also got to know one of our translators pretty well while in Machanga. He used to be a pastor himself in Mozambique. While talking to him, I learned that he had been a pastor for 6 ½ years, but a Christian for only the past 3 years. That’s correct. He was a pastor and not a Christian as was apparently also the case for the pastor at the church where we were doing ministry. While this information is discouraging and disturbing, it just made me realize how important international missions work really is. It brought to life this passage in Romans that God had laid on my heart and helped me to learn and grasp the significance of it. God truly has sent me and those on my squad to areas that are unreached to preach the gospel to those that do not know Jesus and who need to hear about how to have a personal relationship with Him. Please continue to pray that our ministry here in Africa will be fruitful as the next two months here we will undoubtedly be in areas similar to this.
