Heart FOR Africa in the Heart OF Africa

It’s as close to a scene out of the African Queen movie as you can get. Situated on the banks of the Wamba river in DRC, even the name of the village sounds perfect: Kikongo.

Proving that Kikongo is at the Heart of Africa!

But that’s where the similarity to a 19^th century story-book safari ends. Why? First, our visit to Kikongo started with a 59 minute flight in a Cessna 206 piloted by MAF program manager, Nick Frey. Second, instead of the romanticism of a jungle rainforest, we discover some of the tough, realities of mission work in the center of present-day Congo.

Glen and Rita Chapman both grew up in Kikongo as missionary kids. Now, they’ve been serving in this same place for almost three decades with the American Baptist mission. After a mid-morning snack served in the dining room of the house Rita’s grandparents built, we head out to tour the hospital and pastors’ school.

“Some of the things we see happening now are really discouraging and make us wonder if our time of service should end soon. The hospital no longer has adequate funds to maintain normal lab equipment and most doctors find they can make more money selling cheap Chinese medicines in neighboring towns than providing good service here,” Rita explains.

Glen demonstrating his "magnificent flying machine!"

At the pastors’ institute, Rita tells about an even more complex problem. “Self-trained pastors are coming into this area preaching a new version of the prosperity gospel based on an unhealthy preoccupation with spiritual warfare. By instilling fear in the local people about the power of Satan and evil spirits, they find a profitable business offering special prophesy and deliverance prayers for those who will pay for it in order to gain spiritual protection. Churches like these are popping up all over devastating our own congregations. Strong theological training is desperately needed for future pastors, but this competition is challenging their motivation for training altogether.

Despite these discouragements, Glen and Rita carry on with dogged and even creative endurance. A newly, MAF-installed satellite antennae gives them 24-7 connection to the Internet and regular ministry updates on Facebook. And thanks to help from missionary inventor, Steve Saint, Glen regularly flies a powered parachute at tree-top level to nearby villages in order to show the Jesus Film.

Cruising the Wamba River

But the Chapman’s real love for the land and its people is revealed on our dugout canoe ride across the Wamba for lunch at a neighboring village. Showing us the way, they help us dig our fingers into a meal of fish, plantains, squash seed, fermented manioc and stewed greens with caterpillars. It’s clear how much at home they are in this setting and how loved they are by these villagers. It helps me understand the pain in their eyes when they explain the troubling changes happening around them.

“Too bad you didn’t bring your swimming suits,” Glen yells above the din of the outboard motor on our way back to the airstrip for our flight home. “The water’s perfect. . . and the crocodiles stay pretty much in the swamps at this time of day!”

Glen and Rita—I thank God for you and pray for His strength and wisdom as you continue serving Him in this challenging “Heart of Africa.”

Glen and Rita Chapman

Catalytic Boost

The Democratic Republic of Congo is not exactly known for its great reputation of unity. Rampant tribalism and ethnic divisions have kept this country fragmented for years, even within the church community.  That’s why the meeting I attended this week in Kinshasa was so unusual.

I’ve been hosting a first-time visit to DRC by two friends who represent a missions-minded American foundation and thought it would be good for them to hear first-hand reports from national church leaders. Thinking we could have a nice, intimate conversation with ten or fifteen leaders, I was surprised to see our room packed out with over forty-five men and women representing most key national churches and ministries.

In order to help my friends gain a broad perspective, I asked each participant to address questions related to evangelism strategy successes and hindrances. Although each report started out addressed to my guests, it soon changed as people in the room began realizing they were hearing things from each other they had not known before. This was especially true between resource providers, like Scripture Union or Crusade and the actual church denominations that have been struggling to implement new evangelism strategies. It was pretty cool watching the lights come in the eyes of these men and women as they began swapping business cards right there during the meeting in order to connect later.

Equally impressive to me was the long detailed list of obstacles and hindrances discussed during the meeting. Going far beyond the typical gripe of not having enough money, these folks listed sophisticated issues such as lack of credibility of those ministering to professional businessmen, cultural differences over the issue of possessing more than one wife, and racial discrimination between bantu Africans and newly converted pygmy Christians.

By the end of the day, six themes emerged as topics everyone agreed needed more follow-up: youth outreach, holistic evangelism, church planting methods, media, electronic technology, and leadership training. Before we parted for the day, a plan was set up for future meetings on each topic.

Little did I dream that an innocent request for an informational meeting would eventually become a catalytic boost of encouragement toward partnering together in national evangelism for DRC.

Listening Centers

100%!  The answer she finally gave was 100%.

Want to know what the question was? You’ll have to read to the end of this blog.

It’s not every day that I get asked to host someone on a first-time visit to Kinshasa, DRC. For the past couple of days, that’s what I’ve been doing-- introducing two representatives of a significant, mission-minded American foundation to key national church and ministry leaders from this huge country. One of those is Bishop Nyamuke, who has been sharing about five different elements of a national evangelization strategy that includes helping children develop a healthy, Christian world-view.

“We have over 18,000 schools in our country managed by Protestant churches,” he explained. “But even though we are free to teach biblical truth, it’s not happening. Over five million children enter our schools as pagans at  first grade and leave twelve years later still as pagans.”

To emphasize the need for youth outreach further, Nyamuke arranged an entire afternoon for us with school children from two different churches. Through songs and testimonies and even a fiery mini-sermon by a sixteen year old boy, we learned about some of the cool things being promoted among Congo churches. One is the eleven Listening Centers that have been established recently throughout the city of Kinshasa.

Yvonne and her children groups sharing with us in Kinshasa, DRC

“We have learned that many children struggle with deep emotional needs and yet have no place within their families, schools or churches to talk about it,” said Yvonne, one Nyamuke’s designated youthwork trainers. “Now we’re training school chaplains specifically how to listen and sensitively deal with children who are willing to come and open up about their issues.” As we probed further with Yvonne about the types of things children grapple with, we learned that a big one is the sexual abuse of young Congolese girls by fathers, uncles, brothers and other males in their community. 

That’s when I asked my question: “Yvonne, what would you guess is the percentage of teenage and pre-teenage girls in Congo that experience either sexual abuse or harassment?” She paused for a long time before answering, her face becoming quite sober. “Basically one hundred percent,” she said.

For the next three months, I have the privilege of having my four-year-old granddaughter, Elizabeth, living in our home while my daughter’s family is in the USA on furlough.  When I stop and think about Elizabeth growing up in an unsafe world that that had virtually 100% certainty of sexual abuse, it just turns my stomach. And yet, it sounds like that is what every young girl can expect growing up in Congo—and I would suspect a good share of the rest of Africa as well.

If there ever was a time, place and reason for biblical transformation of cultural values, even in African Christian communities, it is this issue in the Congo and it is now!  Thank God for Bishop Nyamuke, Yvonne and Listening Centers that are now beginning to do something about it.