Saving Africa

This past week Brent and Luke got a chance to travel to Munkushi to be a part of a leadership summit with Brian Oldreive from Foundations For Farming. The trip was last minute as a few seats on a private plane opened up for them to attend. The meetings were focused on discussing current issues facing Sub-Saharan Africa particularly pertaining to predicted global food shortages in the next twenty years. It is estimated that by 2035 there will not be enough food produced globally to feed the estimated 8 billion people who will populated the earth at that time. Some of the last tracks of untouched arable lands in the world exist between Southern Zimbabwe and The Democratic Republic of Congo (Zambia lies directly in the middle). Recent trends have seen massive tracks of land in Zambia being bought up by foreign governments including China, Brazil and even the US. The leadership summit focused on utilizing conservation farming, founded on the Gospel of Jesus, to equip Zambians with the skills they need to farm these lands and hence prevent Zambia from being run by foreign entities. The trip provided some great contacts for our ministry. In attendance were leaders from some of the biggest agricultural firms in Southern Africa as well as Brian Oldreive's cousin Gavin Johnson (a member of the 1995 South Africa national rugby team.......remember the movie Invictus?) The trip's events also included a farmer's breakfast for the local men in Munkushi. Gavin Johnson was able to share his testimony about how God has touched his life and the importance Foundations For Farming plays in the Gospel of Christ being spread in Southern Africa. Keep praying for how this amazing program might be utilized to see Zambia become the shining light God has purposed it to be in these last days!

Field Day with Brian

On Monday, 30 farmers from the local surrounding farms got a chance to hear about Gods plans on how to be more profitable in their farming endeavors. Brian Oldreive shared his own experiences as a farmer in Zimbabwe, having his farm taken away in 2002. How amazing it was to hear how God has taught him these particular principals in conservation farming and has blessed his hard work

over the last 30 years with Foundation For Farming. Our hope is that this message will not only change these farms for the better but also these farmers hearts! We look forward to working with these farmers and seeing all that God does!!!

Foundations For Farming

We had the pleasure over the last five days of hosting the founders of Foundations For Farming, Brian and Cath Oldreive. We had a great time of fellowship and sharing the vision concerning how conservation farming might be used to share the Gospel in Chikankata. Brian and Cath had lunch with the chieftenness, had a time of fellowship with members of Mazabuka Community Church (our church) and led a field day for the local farmers to demonstrate the principals of Foundations For Farming. We are very encouraged about what they foresee God doing in Chikankata and other parts of Zambia! It was such a privilege to have them in our home and in our community this week!

Jesus Film

We crammed into two vehicles and drove the team about 45 min into the bush to show the film outside a small school. The church next door to us that we are partnering with showed up early to set up and pray. They found the local witch doctor there also watching as they prepared. The pastor’s wife told us he lives about 100 meters from the school. We know that the God we serve is stronger than any witch doctor but we also know that prayer is important and needed to fight the spiritual battles that we do not see! The night did not go exactly as we planned to say the least! We were not able to show the film because of technical difficulties but we were able to pray for a large group of people. We also had a great time of prayer as a team over this particular area! We know God did something big!! Many were disappointed but we plan on returning and showing the film this Friday May 25th! We know God’s ways/plans are higher than ours and we look forward to seeing how God shows up! Please pray for this outreach on Friday!

Our First Team Visits Chik!

We had a wonderful group of 8 from Honiton, England come for three days to see what we are up to in Chik! We have been greatly encouraged by their church, New Frontiers, in the area of church planting. They have a church plant in Lusaka that have encouraged us and taught us many things about church planting. The team had the opportunity to have lunch and chat with the chieftenness, participate in a Jesus Film outreach and we had a great time of fellowship and worship by our camp fire!

Puppies and Birthday!

We are now proud owners of two Boerboel puppies, Max and Ivy! We have been on the waiting list for almost a year to get them! They are now 12 and 13 weeks old and they are getting tons of love and attention! And thank you to my sweet kids who made chocolate cupcakes for my birthday!!!