Wednesday, October 31st

We woke early to pray and prepare for the Seminar that was being held during the day and for the Crusade later that night. The Seminar is held at a tiny church in a village here in Songo. Local pastors, their wives, and church leaders were in attendance, totaling around 60 people. Although they are leading local churches in Songo, they have little or no biblical training. Thus, this was an opportunity to share some strong but simple biblical truths and training that they could apply to their own churches. While Danny, Lindy, Jay, Mike, Crystal, Pastor Mike and the rest of the Africa team started the seminar, Nick and Glenda were asked to take all of the children for lessons/activities, etc. (think Sunday School mixed with camp activities).

Inside at the Seminar, there was tons of praise and worship, then many people took turns preaching and sharing the word. Danny explained the vision and God’s calling for Wheresoever. Pastor Mike spoke about the spirit of forgiveness, emphasizing love, forgiveness, and acceptance through Peter’s relationship to Jesus (John 21). Jay gave his testimony, and Pastor Kenneth, Anessia, and Christiano also taught.

Outside, Nick and Glenda started off with some fun games to interact with the children, although it started off a bit tough with the language translation. The children in the village spoke Portuguese and Nyuge, while our translators who know English speak Chichewa. So, someone translated our English into Chichewa, and another person who knew Chichewa translated that into Portuguese. Confused? Us too! (this was the same inside at the Seminar). To make it even more confusing, we spoke some broken Spanish as well b/c it is similar to Portuguese. However, a warm smile and a big hug (along with the power of the Holy Spirit) can be understood in any language! Throughout the day, Nick and Glenda had 50-100 children at a time. Most of the time was spent telling children’s stories with a biblical message at the end, singing African worship songs, and playing! Some of their favorite games included follow the leader, chase Nick around, and of course…SOCCER! At the end of the day, the children were ecstatic that we would be returning to the village for 2 more days.

After the seminar ended around 5pm, we started to get ready for the Crusade. A Crusade is when we go right smack into the middle of a village and preach the message of salvation. To get people interested we set up the sound system and pump some music as loud as we can. Typically, it is extremely easy to draw a big crowd. After a short program of dancing, worship, drama, and messages, there is a call for people to give their lives to Christ. Some of the people currently attend church but don’t necessarily have a relationship with Christ, while others may understand that there is a God or almighty being, but they have never heard of Jesus. The goal of a Crusade is to go to a village back to back days-the first day preaching salvation, and the next day to come back for prayer, questions, and to try and get them hooked up with a local church or pastor. At the end, hundreds of people give their lives to Christ. Now, we have no way of knowing if they have done this before or if they are just caught up in the moment and aren’t sure of what is happening, but we have Faith that Jesus is moving in their hearts!

With no time to eat dinner, we headed over to the Crusade around 7pm. There was great worship and dancing, and Danny gave them a background on Wheresoever Ministries and who we were. The African team did a really funny but powerful drama about the prodigal son. Mike S. preached a powerful message of salvation, and Crystal gave her testimony. Christiano and Pastor Kenneth gave the altar call, and 172 people gave their lives to Christ!

Tuesday, October 30th

SOOO much has happened today! Just to help us remember all that we have done, we decided to give you a play by play of our glorious day! (disclaimer-most time frames are a rough estimate!)

5am-7am: Early wake up to pack the vehicle, then have some prayer time before our trip to Mozambique.

7am-9am: We left Lilongwe, Malawi for our journey down south. Lilongwe is the capital of the country of Malawi, and there was a lot going on as we drove through. Many people were on foot, on their way to town and the market to work for the day. We saw numerous people on bicycles carrying fruit, crafts, fire wood, and even live goats!

9am-10am: We arrived at the border and had to go through customs in Malawi before going over to Mozambique. The border is something you might not be very used to; there is a tiny gate which a guard controls by hand, and a small building off to the side. After getting our stamps, we took a nice ½ mile walk to the border of Mozambique while Pastor Kenneth and Bishop Christiano drove behind us. Luckily, we had no problems checking into Mozambique; we already had our visas, plus Danny and Lindy knew the head guy…and he is a Christian! They made no effort to go through any of our bags and luggage, which is a God thing b/c they may have charged us a hefty fee with all of the equipment we had!

10am-11:30am: We traveled to the city of Vila Luongue, where the Missions Base is located.

11:30am-2:30pm: We had a great tour of the Missions Base and met the rest of the African team who would be traveling with us. Pastor Kenneth and his wife Anessia (also a famous Christian singer in Malawi) run Wheresoever World Ministries from the African side, and they are both from Malawi. Anessia runs the Bible School at the Missions Base. This school is for an awesome group of young men in the 20’s who are studying to be pastors. They have an AMAZING heart for the Lord and their Faith in on fire! These guys are truly a servant for the Lord and yearn to do His will every single day. The time is Vila was mostly spent re-packing the vehicles for our trip to Songo for the Seminars and Crusades, as well as mingling with the locals. Many of us practiced our Chichewa and helped pump water from the well for the local Africans. Then we all piled up in the 3 vehicles for our journey! All in all, we took 20 people to Songo for our trip. Along with the 8 american team members, are; Pastor Kenneth, Anessia, Pastor Fife, Bishop Christiano, bible school members Matias, Gift, Moses, Edson, keyboard player Alex, the cook Samuel (who was saved on the first ever Wheresoever Crusade, he used to be a witch doctor!), Chrissy, and Bertha.

2pm-7pm: We enjoyed a wonderful drive to the Tete region. We took our time along the way, making numerous stops to see relatives, friends, ate some sugar cane and bananas, at the market, etc. We also had a great time looking at the breathtaking African countryside, with tiny little villages around every corner. We learned that Portuguese is the official language of Mozambique, but in Vila they speak Chichewa…and in Songo, they speak some Portuguese, some Chichewa, but mainly Shona and Nyuge. WOW! We have our work cut out for us! Almost forgot-as we were driving down the road, two children dressed as witchdoctors were running wild along the road. One was banging two sticks together, while one had a stick and a machete. We stopped and tried to talk to them, but they just made funny noises towards us. It is our prayer that these children were not possessed by demons and witchcraft, but it very much appeared so. (kind of reminds you of the pigs running wild down to the water after Jesus casted out some demons). Oh, and almost got a ticket in Tete while crossing a bridge b/c we apparently made a wrong turn…but Edson told the guard that we were driving to tell people about Jesus, and they let us go! AMEN!

8pm-11pm: After stopping to eat some peanut butter and bread on the side of the road for a quick dinner, we traveled on to Songo. We went an extremely long time without passing any cars, and we started to ascend into a mountainous region. Pastor Kenneth was feeling a bit tired from driving all day long, so Nick got to try his hand behind the wheel. Opposite side of the road…extremly dark…winding roads…a transmission that did not like the steep hills…WOO HOO! Everything was great until close to 20 goats decided to cross the road in the middle of nowhere! However, the only damage that was done was a few people woke up due to the slamming of brakes...we stopped just in time!

After our unloading of the vehicles and settling in, we did not get to sleep until around 1am…BUT, we cannot wait to start the Seminars and Crusades in the morning! PRAISE GOD!

Safe and Sound in Lilongwe!

Ndili Bwino! (I (we) are well!)

Just wanted to give everyone a quick update that we have made it to Lilongwe, Malawi. Getting out of Ethiopia seemed to be a bit tougher than first anticipated. A shuttle bus was scheduled to pick us up at our hotel at 6:30am for our 9:30am flight. We were up and ready to go...and waited...and waited...and called...and waited...at about 8am, we finally decided to flag down a few cabs for an exhilirating crazy ride through downtown! Our flight was great, and we met Danny, Lindy, Pastor Dan, Pastor Kenneth, and Christiano at the airport. Of course, we had some troubles getting through customs with our 13 bags full of all our goodies, but Pastor Dan came in and sweet talked our way through with some help of the Holy Spirit :). Also, praise God that ALL of our bags came through without a scratch on them!

We were going to try and head to the Missions Base in Mozambique, but will not make it tonight due to the border closing time. So, we will hang in Malawi, fellowship with our new friends, try and learn the Chichewan language, and rest up for our journey in the morning!

Zikomo (THANK YOU!) for all your prayers and support! Ambu-yay Akudaditzeni (God Bless You!) By the way, that is NOT the way it is spelled, just how it sounds/looks in the English language!

Off to Malawi!

We have made it safe and sound to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia! Of course, there were a few snags along the way where the Lord showed us some awesome favor! We BARELY made it to the ticket counter on time in Washington DC. For those of you who are familiar with traveling, each passenger is only allowed to check 2 bags with them for the flight. We had 5 people...and 13 bags (tons of supplies, sound equipment, etc,). Also, each bag is only supposed to weigh 50 lbs. or you have to pay an extra fee. Pastor Mike was trying to be a bit smooth as we weighed our bags and was hanging them off the end of the scale so they wouldnt appear to be as heavy! But, more than half of them were over 50 lbs...normally, we would have had to pay TONS of fees due to the extra bags and extra weight. However, the Lord hooked us up! After speaking with the nice people from Ethiopian Air, we were only charged for 2 extra bags (not even our 3rd extra bag)...THATS IT! No extra weight charges, etc. AMEN!

Getting through security was also a challenge. We TOTALLY forgot that Crystal had a whole bunch of medicine and supplies in her carry on bag...liquids, needles, syringes...all the good stuff! Of course, we were stopped...just as we thought everything was going to be taken away, we all stood off to the side and began to pray. You can guess the rest...we got to take it ALL with us! GOD is GREAT!

During the REALLY long plane ride to Ethiopia with a quick stop for gas in Rome, we were able to meet many different people and explain our trip to them. One of them was a man named Amobley, who is living in Richmond but is going home to Rwanda for a month. After our chat with him on the plane, we found out he was staying at the same hotel as us for the night during our layover. During our conversation, we found out that his brother is HIV positive, and he is really struggling with his sickness. We also found out that Amobley is a believer, but couldnt remember a time where he prayed to give his life to Christ. During dinner, we had the chance to minister to him, and we prayed with Amobley for him to give his life to Christ...right there at the dinner table! We also prayed that he would be able to minister to his brother John in Rwanda and that he would be healed. God is already doing some powerful stuff!

Well, we are off to the airport to fly to Malawi. There we will meet up with Danny and Lindy, stay the night at one of the local pastors homes, then drive to Mozambique in the morning. As for prayer requests, please continue to lift up safe travel, healthy bodies, and for us to have a passion and energy to communicate the GREAT NEWS OF JESUS CHRIST everywhere we go! Also, please lift up our new friend Amobley and that he will be on fire for the Lord!

Prayer requests and schedule!

Please pray for Nick Errato, Pastor Mike Parks, Mike Shank, Crystal (soon to be Mrs. Shank), Jay Summers, Danny Bravo and Lindy Bravo as we prepare to journey to Mozambique! We are all EXTREMELY excited about what the Lord has in store for us!

As for specific prayer requests, we humbly ask for you to list these things up to the Lord:
-Safe travels and healthy bodies with tons of energy to serve!
-Please pray that the engine of the "work horse" vehicle is fixed. This is the vehicle that is crucial to the ministry work and crusades, and the engine "gave out" a few days ago.
-Please pray for our schedule and ministry events. Songo is a brand new area to Whersoever, so we really have no idea what to expect.
-Please pray for Mozambique! In a missions class the other night, Jay learned that the Tete and Angonia provinces of Mozambique have no healthy churches or gospel (except for what Wheresoever has done). So, along with a few other villages in the world, these areas are known as the "Final Frontiers" for sharing the gospel!

Summary of current ministry plans: (subject to change)
Oct. 27th-Team departs US
Oct. 28th-Ethiopia
Oct 29th - Team arrives in Malawi
Oct 30th - Travel to Tete (Mozambique)
Oct 31st - Tete baptism, travel to Songo
Nov 1-3 - Songo seminar & evangelistic events
Nov 4 - Travel to Angonia
Nov 5-7 - Angonia seminar & evangelistic events (considering possible change to Macanga)
Nov 8 - Travel to Malawi
Nov 9 - Team flies back home
Nov 10 - Team arrives in Raleigh

Thank you SO MUCH for your prayers throughout our jorney. We will try our best to update the blog every few days, but there is no telling if we will be able to do so :)