Theology of World Missions - Lesson 16

Theology of World Missions
Dr. Peter Kuzmič
wm602-16
Missions in Africa
Lesson Transcript

 

Well, good evening. Let us pray. You are our savior and Lord, and we come to bow before you again and to worship you, Jesus, for all you are and all you do, and for the fact that you have chosen us to do your work. The Kingdom Ministry through weak human instrumentality that we represent. We thank you that you are the Lord of the harvest, and that we are witnesses of a great harvest worldwide. We thank you that you are the Lord of history, oral history, and that you are the ruler of the nations. And because of that, we do not panic. In face of danger, uncertainty or fear. For we know that you the reason, Lord, have all authority in heaven. And on that. So we give you praise and glory tonight, and we pray that you will again help us to have not only open minds, to understand your world and your world and how the two are interconnected, but to have open hearts, to be moved, to serve you in any capacity, any place that you would call us and send us to, we pray your blessing upon our lectures tonight. In this first part of the evening, blessing upon our guest speaker, we thank you for bringing him to gun control. And now we commit to you are those who are not feeling well tonight, members of our class, members of our community, we pray that you will strengthen them, bring healing into their lives, and that you will protect us from danger and illness. All of this we pray in Jesus name and for His glory and his glory alone. Amen. Amen. Amen. Well, here is the procedure tonight. For the first hour, we have a distinguished missionary, senior missionary leader who has taught that seminary level in Africa.

 

So he will be speaking for an hour or so. Answer questions. During the break, he will provide the materials about Africa Inland Mission, one of those agencies that are transforming the face of Africa. I'm glad we have this opportunity to go back to Africa, at least for an hour, hour and a half at most, before we wind up this course next Tuesday evening, because as you have heard me say, Africa is the neglected continent, although we hear on the one hand about the great church growth south of Sahara and the tremendous expansion of the Christian church. Much of it, unfortunately, I don't know that our guest Professor will agree with me or not, seems to be shallow. And there's a lot of syncretism. There's a lot of questioning of the authenticity and credibility of the church. Just keep in mind, for example, that in Rwanda, Burundi, most of those people who have committed those atrocities so recently have actually been Christians, many of them evangelical Christians. This is why we are in this course putting an emphasis on holistic mission. But the church is growing, facing major challenges, major dangers. HIV pandemic, which we have already mentioned several weeks ago when we had guests in our class, and many other challenges that our guest speaker will present to us tonight. And of course, the biggest challenge when you look at the whole of the continent of Africa is Islam moving south, using the power of petrodollar, using the power of Islamic governments. Unfortunately, in many places there is a collision between Christians and Muslims. There are places in Nigeria. There are many other places. We thank God that in Sudan there seemingly has been a breakthrough. Yes, the last week. Let's see if you can reflect on that maybe with us since that happened just very recently.

 

But Africa, a very needy continent, a continent of poverty, a continent of conflicting religions, a continent of. I already mentioned pandemic of HIV and many, many other challenges. So be just open. Maybe the Lord will call some of you to Africa on us and take notes. Take notes. So welcome to Africa. And then later, in the second half of the session tonight, I will be lecturing then again on theology of missions. But let's do this excursion to Africa. And we welcome Mr. Chuck DAVIES, who is a senior representative, national representative for Africa Inland Mission, and as I have already stated, has been a professor, seminary professor in Africa. So we get good. Combination of senior missionary experience and reflection, as well as experience in mobilizing and instructing North Americans for missions in Africa. Welcome. Now, I need to return this Mike to you. All right. I'm always a little bit worried about these microphones and being electrified. Now, I would like to use my normal teaching method, and that is I would much rather scratch where you itch. And there are some of you who have questions, and you don't have always someone with an authoritative answer. I would hope that you would be willing to interrupt me. You can throw shoes, you can throw books, throw money, but just get my attention and I will try to vary and move in your direction. But until you move me left or right, let's get introduced to the continent of Africa. It's a very large continent. It has 51 countries on the mainland and a number of islands surrounding Africa, the fourth largest island in the world, Madagascar, is there on the south eastern side. The Comoro Islands, where we work is between Madagascar and Tanzania.

 

The Comorian Islamic Republic controls three of those four islands. One of the other islands, Mayotte, is actually a colony of France or an extension of the French presence in the Indian Ocean. And so there are great numbers of countries. I worked in the Congo. I feel that I can speak on other countries. If you have particular questions about what is happening in the Congo right now, I think I can speak to that place. I began as a missionary. We entered the Congo within three months of entering that country. I became with my family political hostages. And so for the next three months, we were on the edge of the precipice, and we could have been killed any time. All that we owned was destroyed. We lost our home. We lost our car. Everything we owned. My library was burned and my golf clubs were spread all over the Ituri forest. Now, as an anthropologist, I'm very interested in that. How that when my seven iron is rediscovered in a pygmy village, how they will interpret that artifact, you have to sort of smile because the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away. Blessed be the name of the Lord. There are no you harlots on hearses, and we're not going to take anything with us. And despite that wonderful proverb that we have here in America showing such great wisdom, and that is that he who dies with the most toys wins. It's not true. And a Christian is called to give everything to God. And so this great, great continent, I worked in the third largest country. If you were to try to measure Africa, you could take three of the continental United States and fit it into the geography of the African continent.

 

Zaire, the third largest country, or Congo, as it's called again today, is about the size of the United States, east of the Mississippi. So we're talking of a significant landmass in which there are 240 different languages. And so that when you go to church very, very often, there may be as many as 12 to 15 tribes in that particular church situation. The African continent, nobody can reach it all. It's like, well, for instance, in Chad, where we work, we work in the southern part of Chad, which is also a very, very large country right in this area here. And that area, the Cherry River, is one of the aims that we had back in 1895 when we entered into Africa in Mombasa. The founder of the mission in 1895 wanted to make a chain of mission stations all the way from Mombasa through to Lake Chad to help us to block the Islamic invasion from the north. They were moving south all the time. That was our aim. And it's only been in recent years that we are working under the African church in Chad and training African evangelists to reach cross-culturally to other tribes. The country of Chad has 180 different tribes and languages and cultures. Only 60 of these cultures have been reached, with the gospel message leaving 120 tribes which are unreached. There is no country in Africa that has this many unreached tribes, and all of these tribes in the north are Muslim ized Muslims means that they came in not that many hundred years ago and they put a sword to the throat of the leadership and said, You have your choice. You will become Muslim or you will die. The village will be destroyed, the women and children will be taken, the men will all be killed.

 

And that was the choice they had. So many of them just took on Islam as a veneer so that they could learn by parrot memory, the shahada, and they they could say certain of the Koranic verses and they could set up their minarets and they could waken you in the morning before dawn, before Chuck Davis wants to get up. And they could call out over the city in Arabic for you to come to the first time of five prayer periods during the day. Now, I'm not against five prayer periods. I wish more Christians did it because God isn't going to work in Bosnia. He's not going to work in Paraguay, He's not going to work in Colombia, and he's not going to work in Congo without the prayers of the church. God refuses to do it. That is the way that he has ordained that he work. And so when we even put on the armor of the spirit, the armor just freezes up because prayer is the oil that makes the armor work. We're not all called to reach out to everywhere, but God does set certain countries in our heart just as eternity is in our heart. Well, I was here at Gordon Conwell. I did everything possible to resist missionary commitment. I grew up in the inner city of Boston, in Roxbury, the black ghetto. And I said to God, with all the honesty that I could raise, Lord, I'll do anything you want me to do except work with black people. And the Lord laughed at me. The Lord must just enjoy smiling when we have these crazy things that we come up with, he said. Why do you think I grew you in the ghetto? You play basketball black. You think black.

 

I'm not wasting my time. Well, then the Lord seemed to be indicating that I go to to speak in French. There were 14 Francophone countries in Africa. He wanted me in the Congo, and he didn't even send me a special invitation. I had no angel slip into my room and say, Chuckie boy, I want you in the Congo. I mean, that's not the way it happens. God never sent me a gold plated invitation like those when I was pastoring in Switzerland. You had to have to go to the home of a friend. We just talk about. Oh, why don't you drop over to the house Friday night for supper? Here in America, they don't do that in Switzerland. You have to have this engraved invitation to go. God didn't give me an engraved invitation. God just gave me the same word in five separate books of the Bible saying that I love the world and I want the world reached with the message of my son. And so, you know, I mean, I couldn't deny the fact that there had been a general appeal to reach to all the ethno all of the ethnic groups of the world. And so I knew if I stayed home with my education that I would, in fact, be walking in disobedience. Now, can I make this clear to you as a class? It was not clear to me until well into my Christian life. God does not call you to Congo. God does not call you to Bosnia. God does not call you to New York City. God called you, called you to obedience. That's what calling is about in the New Testament. We have a Greek verb collateral, which is the verb to call. It's used 296 times.

 

Only four times is this verse used to be called into missionary service. So when pastors get so excited and they want me to talk about my call, I don't know what to say. I've never been called. I never had this amazing, angelic sort of greeting to go to the ends of the earth. But I knew that God loves the world and he wants to reach all of the world, and that's his plan. That's what he wants to do. So I trust that you'll understand me. I'm not a heretic at this point. And I came to this seminary working with Dr. Roger Nicole, which was a great privilege. I was his fellow in systematic theology because I couldn't enter my program at Harvard to do my anthropology degree. I wanted to dig up Mayan cities on the Yucatan Peninsula. I wanted nothing to do with missions. And so with that kind of attitude, how was God going to work with a hardheaded, stiff necked inner city person like myself? But God just kept banging away. In one of Dr. Kerr's classes, we had to read 100 pages of extra collateral reading every week. I chose the books I read, done the two volumes, Henry Stanley, Darkest Africa. I read Morehead, the White Nile and the Blue Nile. I read the two biographies of David Livingstone, who died at the Gigi in Africa, and I read a book about Speke, who was one of the explorers who opened up the area around what was called Lake Albert, which is now presently on the map. Lake Cecil, Second Mobutu. 20, 20 feet above sea level. Part of the source of the Nile and all of its all of its energy. Now, if you were to go to where the seminary moved out of the forest, up to Bunia in the northeast, and you went to take a child's protractor and put the point in Bunia and draw a circle of 100 miles from Bunia.

 

Every one of those books took place within that circle. I'm talking about a sovereign God, a God who even uses our choices to put us under conviction and to bring knowledge to us that we might do that which will glorify him and will give us growth. I think that's very, very important. I noticed that most of you are sleeping. I don't hear any questions, and so I'm just going to go on for a few more minutes before I awaken you. But listen, if you have questions, please ask. So I move into Congo. I arrive because of my very, very hard head. I do not learn languages as other people know. I'm bilingual now. French is my second language. But the Lord says, I want you to go, not just to teach in primary school. I want you to teach on the seminary level, training church nationals in the country of Congo. I said, Lord, I understood. My seminary training was good. I understood that you knew everything. Not only did you know everything in the present, but you knew everything in the past. Don't you remember? The only thing I ever failed was French and Latin. I missed high honors in college with a C in French, and my teacher just cried and cried. But that was all I was capable of doing because I learn languages more carefully and more slowly than other people. But I learned them better. And so God was developing me and I had to stay another three months in Europe. And that three months put us into Congo just as the Simba rebellion was beginning. And all of the pain and all the death that took place in that period, during that period of time, we lost all that we owned.

 

We lost, as I said, my library, which had books in it that were irreplaceable. But above all, we lost 32 missionary friends whom we loved and who were murdered during that period. Some of you remember the if you don't, your parents will remember the name Dr. Paul Carlson. He was a missionary surgeon, worked up in the northern part of Congo. He was taken hostage, brought down into the area where we were living near the area of KISS and was called Stanleyville in those days after Henry Stanley. He was reported to the people that he was a colonel in the Central Intelligence Agency and that he was responsible for the United States giving two Grumman Hellcats to the national Army. And those two Hellcats were causing a great deal of confusion. The rebels were losing the war. So, Dr. Carlson was the object of affliction? Well, when the Belgian pair of commandos came in to rescue us, Dr. Paul Carlson and I were together. It happened this way. We were all moved into a hotel. I was separated from my family. They were on a mission station five miles outside the city limits. There was no hotel big enough to take care of 235 hostages Belgians, Americans, men, women and children. My family was not there. We went into the Victoria residence, the largest hotel in the town, And then the Belgian commandos came and I was sitting at the window at 630 in the morning reading my Bible. A Grumman Hellcat went right by the window. It was really quite frightening, you know, And all of a sudden, all of the guns in Stanleyville were pointed into the sky shooting at this plane. It wasn't firing its rockets. It wasn't shooting its machine guns. It was drawing attention to that part of the city while the Belgian commandos landed at the airport.

 

And then there came a knock on the door, something I never could understand why a man with an automatic weapon knocked on the door. I just. I can't understand that the guy can't be a private He can't be anything less than a colonel if he's carrying an automatic weapon. You do what he says. And he said, Everybody downstairs in the street. And so we went to the street. Well, I didn't. I got to the stairs and found I had forgotten something. Anybody want to guess what I forgot? Everybody says that I've had 100,000 people respond like that. No, it wasn't my Bible, because I'm one of those very strange people who have coded for myself a thousand pages of reading a month. So I always have something in my belt. My Bible was in my belt. I had forgotten my toothbrush. Now, if you're a psychology or a counseling major, don't talk with me afterwards as to why? Because I don't know. But I went back at risk of my life. I went back to the to the room and it turned into this is the very Bible that I had in my belt. This is the Bible I had, which I, I read one and a half times during those three months of incarceration. And God opened his word to me under those circumstances, in a way he never has since and never did before. I'm ashamed to say that I prayed in that period of my life in a way that I have never prayed before or since because our life was on the edge of eternity. I know eternity was in my heart. I knew that if I died, I would go to heaven. But God, through his word, kept giving me promises.

 

I wasn't going to die. Now let's. Let's go to one of those so that we can give you some hope in the midst of it all. The 52nd chapter of Isaiah. Marvelous. Marvelous chapter. Marvelous chapter. At the end of the 52nd chapter. Must be a different Bible I have here. I can't find it. But at the end of the the end of this chapter, I had read this chapter as I was having my devotions in the morning, and I got nothing from it. Have you ever read your Bible and got nothing from it? You know, it's like learning Greek verbs. Erica My elusive mail phone. L.A. Luther How many times do you learn that before it sits in your mind? For me, it was 400 times I had to learn it and learn it. And learn it and learn it again. The Korean students were amused by the fact that I thanked the Korean music people in Korean this morning. Now I don't speak Korean, but somebody came up and gave me a nice compliment. They said that was pronounced perfectly. You know, I'm like that. I like to learn languages. But there are some times I read the Bible like it's written in Hebrew, like it's written in some Yugoslavian dialect, like it's written in Roxbury. Black English. I can't, I can't understand. Nothing came. So that night was a Friday night and God sent a thunderstorm into the ATRI forest. We lived in the artery with 180 foot trees, a crocodile infested river right behind the station with the messages going up and down the river at nightfall from the drums. And you could hear any day the trumpeting of an elephant or the roaring of a lion in the forest and around the house in which we lived in the previous 18 months to our arriving, almost 70 snakes, poisonous snakes were killed in the vicinity of that house.

 

And I was living in it with my wife and the two children. So this is the kind of situation in which we were. But that thunderstorm woke no one but myself. So I got up. I got a candle. I made my way to table lit the candle. And I'm not happy with not being able to find a verse. So I'll look at this up. Maybe this Bible didn't have that verse. You know, there are 31,178 verses. So, you know, it is kind of hard to pin things down sometime while you're laughing. There are 2930 named characters in the Bible. Did you know that? And for me, some of the most interesting people aren't named. Wouldn't you like to know Lot's wife's name? Have you no interest in knowing Noah's wife's name? Who cooked for 120 years while they built that big boat? You know, I mean, there are so many, many people in the Bible unnamed. What about jobs, Wife? No. The one whom he would would have been better off without this blessing. That said, curse God and die. I'd love to know her name. Whatever it was. Here in the Bible. I want to read to you the passage that I read in the 52nd chapter, the 12th verse, the 52nd chapter in the 12th verse. Now, these are the verses I read in the morning. Now I have a candle. I'm in the middle of a thunderstorm that is rocking the house. Not a single soul other than myself is up. But you will not leave in haste or go in flight for the Lord will go before you and the God of Israel will be your rear guard. And I started arguing with God. I said, Listen, Lord, it's been rough here with these rebels around.

 

I've already made arrangements with Africans who will take my family out onto that river and with a dugout canoe will get us out of this area, away from the rebel presence. I'm responsible for those two children. But God wouldn't listen to my argument. He says you'll not go in haste. You'll not depart like this in flight. But I will put a wall of fire round about you. The next day we were arrested. They went out to search for all Americans. That next day on Saturday. And the only ones they found was the Chuck Davis family. I think God has a real sense of humor because they went looking for a man named Al Larson, particularly, he was the field boss of the Evangelized field mission in that area. And they took a wrong turn and found me. I wasn't that pleasant. Someone who had no friends. I didn't know the culture. I didn't speak the languages in the area. God chose me. Now God does choose us in the 119th Psalm is a very, very seductive verse, and it says, It was good that I have suffered, that I might learn your law. Some of us have to go into the fire to understand how big God is, and it's all right to tremble on the rock, remembering that the rock will never tremble under us. It's all right to be afraid, because to say to someone, Fear not as God did, you know, over 100 times in the Bible, God said something similar to fear not. And he said it to Moses. He said it to Joshua. He said it to Peter, He said it to Paul. So I'm in good company. If I was afraid because it's contrary to fact condition in English grammar to say, Doctor Cosmic, don't be afraid unless he is afraid.

 

So when God says you're afraid. Don't be afraid to be afraid, because it's that fear that will help you to lean on him. For he does not give us the spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a disciplined mind. That's our God. That's our sovereign God who makes us invulnerable until he's finished with us. I believe that I've faced the rifle, I've been beaten, I've been shot at. And I believe I'm here tonight to encourage you to obey God, no matter where He leads you, whether it's into the inner city of Boston or into the problem places of the world, whether it's China or Korea. Or the ends of the earth, which are Congo. Now, Congo is not the ends of the earth, but you can see the end from where I lived. You can see where it ends. So I trust that God will encourage you with that type of rhetoric, because it's important that we understand our God is sovereign. He has a design, he has a goal, and his goal is to reach the nations. And yet, despite that design, there are still 4000 tribes in the world, many of which are in Africa. In Chad, I mentioned that there are 120 unreached tribes more than any other country in all of Africa. And so that there's still a big job to do. Don't think it's done. Now, Do you have any questions? I mean, as I say, I would like to scratch where you itch and I could go off in any number of directions. Yes, ma'am. What's happened after you look back for you? Oh, dear. I knew someone would ask that. What happened after I went back to for my toothbrush? Well, when I got back to the stairwell, the only other person in the building was Dr.

 

Paul Carlson. And so we left the building together several minutes after all of the other hostages had left. And so we had to run. There was a guard knowing we were in the building, waiting at the bottom of the stairs. He forced us to run to catch up. Now, I didn't know what was happening. I didn't know the Belgian pair of commandos were landing. But Paul Carlson was on an upper story and he could see the parachutes blossoming from the sky. And so he knew there was something going on. And so we're running out of breath and we're talking about this and talking about why we were brought out into the street. Why Colonel Al Pepe was with us. He was the second in charge of the entire rebellion. And he had been very soft regarding the political hostages. And perhaps he was taking us out to be a shield against the oncoming the para commandos. We didn't know, but perhaps he was bringing us out also to negotiate. And so I said, stump something very, very foolish. And I said to Paul, I said, you know, President Johnson has asked for your life. He has asked publicly in an international press for the life to be spared for this missionary. He is not a CIA agent. And so this means that when you get back to the United States, he's going to want to have an interview with you and your head's going to get as big as a pumpkin. And he looked at me very serious. Now we're running along the street and we're talking like this. And he said, Chuck, I'm not leaving here. I'm not leaving here. God. God had given him an epiphany or some knowledge of the fact that he was going to die in the street that day.

 

And he did. And in a very few minutes, after a series of events, Dr. Paul Carlton was machine gunned out of my hands as we were trying to climb a wall together to get into the protection of a porch and then into into a house. So that's what happened, what the toothbrush caused. And then that's what I say. So many people spend all of their life finding God's will for their life. And let's see. Let's see now what's his will? But what school should I go to? What should my major be? What should my spouse be like? Should I marry a green skinned person from northern Alaska? Should I marry a tall Tutsi from Burundi? And they get all tied up in this. What am I going to do? How big a house should I own? What car should I drive? These are big things, but God wants us bringing to him all of the matters that pertain to his will. And one of them is not stealing answers on an examination. I bring this up to students and they look shocked. And later, individuals will come to me and say, I didn't know God was concerned about that. I'm training for ministry. I just didn't have time. I work 40 hours a week. So did I. But I never stole anybody's answer on an exam. But that's being done all the time. And that's called Thou Shalt Not Steal, not to court. You know how to go to court? Well, of course not. It wouldn't happen here. But the fact is. I have been in seminaries where many of the students are receiving in the male prescriptions of Playboy magazine in the United States of America. Over 35,000 pastors are receiving that magazine in the mail.

 

My friends, this is a pornographic nation. And if you go about the world flaunting the fact that the United States is a Christian country, you haven't traveled. You need the African proverb that says he who does not travel knows only his mother's cooking. You have blinders on. There is sin all around us in this country, and God is making this country a mission field for the world. As many of the cream of other nations are coming here for preparation, we have an obligation to explain to them about the Christ. We have 6 million Muslims in this country. What a chance to speak with them. Some of them are violent. Some of them are not. All of them are involved in a false campaign regarding the definition of Islam. Ten days ago, I was in Minneapolis, Minnesota. I don't recommend you go there. I was in an ice storm. Oh, you know, I wanted to die with my feet in the sand, not in the snow. The banner newspaper headline Islam Equals Peace. That's blasphemy in the name of the Islamic scholar in his picture was down there. That's blasphemy. The name Islam doesn't go back to the Root Salama piece. It goes back to the root submission. Islam equals submission to the will of Allah so that when things don't go their way, they in a very, very committed way, can hunch their shoulders and say, inshallah, it's the will of God. Very, very determined. My friends, I've been doing a great deal of reading on the terrorism that's going on in the world today. And when you can do things such as is being done in the terrorism that is on an international scale, and you can say this is the will of Allah, that is not the same God as the Christian God.

 

And that's what's going on in the American press to try to convince you in a Hindu sense, if you will, that we are all climbing a mountain with different paths. One path is called Zoroastrianism. Another is called Buddhism. Another is called Hinduism. Another is called Islam. Another is called Jehovah. The other is called Jesus. And when we get to the top, we'll all realize that we were following the same God. It's just not true. It's just not true. Our God is a very, very exclusivist God, a personal, infinite God who loves the world, who created the whole world, and who wants us in his image to love that whole world. We're shaped that way. That's how God shaped us as new creations. He put gifts in us, many of which are undeveloped, so that we might reach out to other people around the world. Does that answer your question? Toothbrush. You know this psychologist. They had a wonderful time with me. I mean, I didn't go for counsel, but, you know, they heard about it and they came to me and they said, Chuck, that's crazy. I mean, you risk your life for a toothbrush. Did you want your teeth clean in case you were on the cover of Life magazine? I mean, what was in your mind? I don't have any idea, except God put the thought there. I would have probably gone back for my Bible had I left it. But I didn't. I didn't leave it. That is another question. That was a good one. Another question? Yes, sir. Let's talk a little bit about the status of southern areas of. Yeah. African mission really believes in this. That is in the training of nationals. Our job is to train the church to such an extent that it can be self-sustaining.

 

The church cannot be self-sustaining at the moment without the expatriate missionary coming in and doing a great deal of that discipleship. Through a seminary, for instance, a seminary curriculum, giving them opportunity to use that degree to go on to higher degrees and thus gain status with the government, with the church, bringing respect to the church. Our seminary in Congo, while I was there, the 14 years I was there, we graduated two different men who became the presidents of their church in Congo. Now that does a very, very strategic job when we're creating men such as this and opening up to them. Dr. Cosmic made a reference that I'd like to go back to about all of the people. 25,400 people a day are accepting Christ in the African continent. About 37,000 a day are accepting the Lord in Latin America, The fastest growing segment of the church in the world outside of China is in Brazil. Portuguese speaking country. But my friends, with all of those people coming into the church, one of our church leaders in Kenya said Our church here in Kenya. And he was talking about the Africa Inland Church, the one we had given birth to. We have 2 million baptized converts in the country of Kenya. 5400 congregations. And he said, we are a mile wide and a half inch deep. And so he was speaking the truth. We must get into that continent to disciple the church. And many of these people will leave the established church, the established evangelical church, and they will move into all sorts of terrifying sects which are contrary to Scripture and undermine the inspiration of Scripture, which is basic to our belief. And so we must get in there and preach the word and open the word.

 

I used to begin my theology classes with my first year students by saying to them, Your father is probably a very holy man. And because he's your father, I love him in the family of God. But we're not going to talk in this class about what your father thinks. This verse says your pastor. It probably has a tear stained Bible. And though he died only six grade education, I have no doubt about his love for Jesus. But in this class, we're not going to talk about how he interprets this passage. We're going to talk about what Matthew says and what Jeremiah says and what Jesus says. The greatest of all of the interpreters of Scripture. It was Jesus that gave us, if anything at all in the 12th of Matthew the rationale that Jonah was a real person. Because this story hidden in the Old Testament, was to be a representation of Jesus going into death for three days and then coming out successfully in the will of God. And it was Jonah. So this is the purpose of God. So if we're going to go to Africa without prior support, if we're not going to go without a developed prayer life of our own, if we're not going to go without taking the map book with us and learning what God wants us to learn today from his word, Now you can get very busy parsing Hebrew verbs at the school. You can get very busy learning about the history of missions and the philosophy of how to do this or that. But the most important thing you should bring from the school is the integrity of this book, because it's this book that's going to change lives, not you. There's a story about Dwight L Moody, one of my favorite characters, and he was greeting people around the platform, and a man came staggering down the aisle and put both hands on his shoulders and in a very intimate way, stuck his alcohol breath right in Moody's face.

 

And he said, Mr. Moody, I'm one of your converts. And he said, That's right. The Holy Spirit never touched you. I don't want you to ever misunderstand that if you have the opportunity to lead someone to Jesus Christ, that's all you did. You led them. It was the Holy Spirit that wooed him into the family of God. Okay, so let let's not make any mistake about this. God. If he uses you to bring people to himself, you're only being a channel. You are not the modus operandi. The modus operandi is the Holy Spirit drawing people to himself. See that word collateral that we used before? You see that call? You are called to obedience. You are called into the family of God. You are called to do what God wants you to do. But call has very, very little to do with something. God's already made clear in Genesis 12 that I'm interested in all of the world. I'm interested in the nations. You see, because they will come from Israel, according to Galatians three, they will come from Israel, a seed. And that seed is Jesus and he is the one who will save the world. Yes. And I mean. Oh, no, no question. That's honest is the wrong question. What's your view of life? Oh, very good. Very, very good question. What is my view of the role of the church? What are they doing in the political scene of the country? Let's go to Uganda for a moment and then I'll come back to Congo. Uganda never bought the American propaganda that condoms would stop or slow down the advance of the HIV virus in Africa. Uganda never bought that story. There is an evangelical who is a specialist. He is a Brit.

 

He begins by talking to a group of several hundred doctors and nurses. And he starts this way. How many of you? I want you to raise your hand? Not here. How many of you are condom babies? And very quietly, with the British audience, they don't respond like we do. They are very slow. One hand here and one there. Maybe out of that 300 people, there'd be 15 hands. Now, if you're a condom, baby, and your mother was fertilized despite this precaution. How in the world are you going to be protected from the HIV virus, which is 100 times smaller than human sperm? Condoms don't work in Uganda. The Southern Baptist brought a program into the country, and with the help of Mussolini's wife, who is a Tutsi and an evangelical Christian, a committed lady, the first lady in Uganda is a Christian. They began a program that is true Love will wait. Last year, 180,000, Uganda's youth carried a flag with their name on it and stuck it in the lawn of the White House. Can that great? You know, when you think about this, it's incredible. See 180,000 people who have made the promise to God that abstinence before marriage is the only way to stop this. And it's the only country in Africa that has reduced its rate of the HIV virus. It went from 31% of the population being infected. It is now at 19%. And praise God, because that's the biblical message. That you shouldn't be fooling around before marriage. Now, as people in the United States are accepting the Lord. Later and later in life, I'm in the secular university scene quite a lot. And I'm told sometime by a an InterVarsity leader that Chuck, please remember not to use Christian vocabulary.

 

And so I'll sort of push him and I'll say, Well, why not? He said, Well. He said. Three quarters of the young people in this meeting tonight will have accepted the Lord on campus within the last 12 months, and that's happening more and more. So there's a pre Jesus life where you've been sinning, where you've been been doing drugs, we've been involved in sex, and now they're new creatures and they're forgiving and they're purified before God. But they have all these experiences that are baggage and they have to come to this place where they understand, Hey, God still accepts me. He loves me as he's shaped me as I am. It is rare that in an orientation school with Africa England mission, we don't have at least two ladies who have been abused by their fathers. And they have forgiven their fathers and they are moving on to further life. My friends, we can use no excuse for obedience to God. And when we refuse to forgive those who have misused us, we are walking against the clear prescriptions of the Word of God. Now, it's not easy to forgive. And the disciples thought they were doing a great job by saying, Oh, Lord. We'll forgive seven times. You know, I only supposed to forgive twice. And the Lord said, Seven times 70 is okay. Stop counting. Forgive. Because if you will not forgive. Why should I forgive you? It's the Lord's Prayer. Oh, my day. Is there anything more basic to Christianity than the Lord's Prayer? That is the disciples prayer. The Lord didn't need that prayer. But what's happening is so many people don't understand the word of God. They take the Sermon on the Mount and they push it somewhere hundreds of years into the future.

 

When the kingdom comes on Earth, God wants us to live like that now. Those who use us badly, bless them, and they don't know what to do with that. They don't know what to do with that. Let's go into Congo just for a moment. Congo is so confused. I'm not sure I can answer that question. From the Congo point of view, because there is no law in Congo. If you have a bigger gun, you are the law. Three countries are invading that country to try to annex land to their own countries. And I'm ashamed to say that Uganda is one of those countries. Zimbabwe is another. Zimbabwe is in turmoil financially right now in the capital of Mutare. You cannot follow a funeral to the cemetery. Only the hearse can go to the cemetery because they are burying every day in the capital city of Zimbabwe 35 to 50 people who have died of AIDS. AIDS is pandemic in Africa. And whole nations are at risk. We're dealing with a people in Lake Victoria. They're called the CSA people. These CSA people live on islands and they're fishermen. Some of those islands, the HIV presence is up to 95% of the population in ten years. All of those people will be dead. And we have the task of reaching them with the gospel and the forgiveness of Jesus before they die. This is what we're all about. This is what will please God. So we do have that responsibility. I don't know. In a chaotic situation, if you could do anything but pray for Congo. Congo is in real turmoil right now. Every month I'm hearing of people whom I know who have been murdered. Two tribes in the middle of all of this, these three armies, one from Rwanda and from Zimbabwe and from Uganda.

 

In the midst of all of that chaos, which the central government in Kinshasa, a thousand miles away, cannot control. Point to the map. Point to the map. Yes. Point to the map. Yes, Kinshasa. Here we have the Republic Democratic Republic of Congo. Right here is the center of the forest. Stanleyville. Over here is the capital city of Leopoldville. Or now it's called Kinshasa. All it did was go back to the tribal names of the villages that were that were there. So in Kinshasa, a very, very large city, almost 40 million people. The city is huge, but the city is in absolute chaos. Most of it is the greed of man. The Congolese people are wonderful, loving, accepting people. If you go to Congo with a family and with your pots and pans, they're just going to smile and they just love having you there. But there's so much greed on that higher level of power that it is very, very difficult to do anything in an orderly fashion. So what we just got, we we are going in there constantly. We've had to close our medical center in Congo. That's how confusing it is. The indignity, which is one of the clans of the land. Do people, a thousand of them last year just descended on the medical center and killed a thousand. Hammer. So all this tribal warfare is going on now. Does anyone want to try to just define racism? I don't want you to do it, but they might want to do it because I grew up in the black ghetto. First football team I played. I was the only white guy. So my nickname was There's no blacks here, Whitey. Isn't that an interesting name? Now, racism has nothing to do with the color of your barn.

 

In Africa, every tribe is suspicious. Every tribe is belligerent toward the tribe right next to them. And they're all black. So what is racism? Racism is one group saying to another group, I'm better than you are. And so that we can have in Rwanda and Burundi, we can have two people like the Hutu and the Tutsi saying, I'm better than you are and I'm better than you are, and we can end up killing 2 million people who are brothers in Christ and many times killing them in church. Now, I'm not going to justify what the Muslims are doing in southern Sudan. There is an attempt to genocide, the entire black race of southern Sudan, and it's an oil question. There was oil found in southern Sudan, 70 wells giving up to 280 barrel a thousand barrels of oil a day. And so they went in Khartoum and just changed the border so that those oil wells were found in the north. And now there is a resistance from the people they play. The people's Army and the people's army are trying to destroy and trying to sabotage all of that work with the oil the oil money in the world. Press is being used for education and health. That's a lie. It's being used to buy Russian tanks and Antonov bombers and all kinds of gunships. We just lost in southern Sudan one of the best groups working with us for the health of the people there. They're called Medicins Sans Frontier Doctors Without Frontier. Last year, they were in a situation where they were distributing food to about 3000 women and children. All of a sudden, two gunships from Khartoum appeared on the horizon and fired five missiles into that group, killing hundreds of people.

 

And they felt they had to take their workers out. They couldn't put them in that kind of danger. That's what we're facing. There was an a Samaritan's Purse hospital in southern Sudan in a place called Louis. And at Louis regularly there are bombs being dropped from those Russian bombers on that hospital. And there was a big cross. And that cross is being used as a target. Distribution centers for food in the South are being bombed. At one time at a place called Look at Yo Yo, which is one of our Africa Inland Mission stations right on the border of Southern Sudan. I have word from that small station that at one time there were 15 C-130 Hercules troop carriers filled with grain just waiting to bring in to the starving people. And Khartoum would not give flight permission to let those planes go in. My friends, the world is in a mess. And it's the greed of men. But we have a message which is beyond that, the love of God and the love of one family. I can't explain all this killing and all this death, but I do know this, that you are here. You are in the land of the dying. Now, is that clear? I have Medicaid. I know. I don't look that old. Thank you. I have Medicaid. I have aspirins. I have hay fever, medicine. I raised four children. I have a mortgage. Feel sorry for me. Don't feel sorry for Christians who die because they are in the land of the living. See. God is not a God of the dead. He is a God of the living. And those who have transferred from this veil of tears into glory are much happier. They're in a better place.

 

So let's not get that all mixed up. As we obey, God sometimes will put us in difficult places. But it's all right. Because He can give you a code of invulnerability. Until he's finished with you. Now, I know Dr. Guzman can speak to this because I prayed a great deal for him and his family. As shells were hitting near his home, particularly for your daughter. And the trauma this was causing. So I know he understands what I'm saying, but God is our shield and buckler, not some political system and not a few more intercontinental ballistic missiles. If we are going to win the world to Christ, then it is going to cost soldiers of the cross. Or just the Moody Bible Institute a few weeks ago, and a young man with operation mobilization. I want to say this as kindly as I can. Gary cannot speak publicly. He is not a good public speaker. But God used him in the most amazing way at Moody as he spoke of the work that he and his wife were involved in with working with Palestinian refugees. And one morning she went down to the dispensary early and she was setting up the medicine for the day. A knock came on the door. She presumed it was her husband and it was two terrorists who filled her body with bullets. They'd only been married a very, very short time. And his attitude was so good and understanding that his wife, whom he deeply loved, was now absented from the body and thrust into eternity. That we at 300 Moody Bible Institute students when the invitation was given. Well, they went forward and they didn't go forward to sign cards. They went forward to lay on their faces before the platform and back through the aisles.

 

They were late and they wouldn't leave for 2 hours. That is not Garry's preaching. That is the work of the Holy Spirit. That kind of thing is what we would need around the world revival. We need an understanding of how powerful God is. Despite the opposition for greater Aceh that is in us than he that is in the world. I'm sorry. I wish I could speak with more authority to that. To that question. Yes, sir. I'm sure you can. We're working at it. We're working at it. But up to this point, up to this point in Congo, in Congo, there have been more people killed in Congo in the last five years that have been killed in any war since the Second World War. 3 million people have been killed. And all of them have not been in battle. Many of them have been in this tribal warfare where the only reason you are going to die, my friend, is because you are from another tribe. And I don't like you. Nothing you've done to me. You have the physiognomy, you have the tribal markings on your face, you are from the other tribe. And I'm better than you are. Your dead. Now, that's a terrible thing. And, you know, most of the world doesn't even know about it. The world press won't touch it any more than they'll touch the war in southern Sudan. And so you have to count on visiting people who have been on the spot and who have seen these things to get the truth that will set you free. The power of God into salvation is great, but we have to strengthen the depth of the church in Africa. We have to disciple that church, not just bring them to Christ.

 

It irritates people when I speak on Matthew 28 because they really think that evangelizing is going out there for five weeks and bringing people into the kingdom. That's only the start. The main verb is discipling the nations, and that's hard work. That's what missionaries do in discipling the nations and bringing them into an understanding of what God wants to do in their lives. So that's our task. Teachers. I can't overemphasize how important teachers are right now in the training of African church leadership. I think it's very, very important. Is there another question? None of you are sleeping anyway. You're not asking questions, but you're not sleeping. I appreciate that. Remember I mentioned in chapel, I'm under no illusion because your eyes are open. You're listening. Some of you have Palm Pilots out there and some of you are thinking a date later this evening or thinking of an exam you have in a short time or a book you must read before you can go to the hay. So I'm under no illusions, please. Yes. Oh, yes. African women are certainly African women. I want to say this as carefully as possible. African women are the steal. Tip of the of the spear in evangelism. We have a group in Congo called the One. Okay. How about in Gemma? The Women of the Good News. And these women regularly are memorizing scripture verses together, having prayer together, visiting hospitals, visiting prisons, going into the marketplace, and witnessing which men in their chauvinistic approach are finding very, very difficult to do. But the women are doing it. And yes, women are coming into seminary. Women are being trained for Christian service. And on the bad side of this, some of the most dangerous people in the sex are these women witchdoctors who have tremendous control over large parts of the population.

 

So it's yes, women have a powerful way in African life. A very powerful way. Yes, sir. For a. Yes. Well, we've been involved in this stuff for 43 years, so I guess I'm at the. Yeah, I can't be average. No, I don't think it is. But we have more second, third and fourth generation missionaries in the Africa England mission than any other mission in the world. And part of that is that our at our school, the children are given opportunity. Rift Valley Academy, where they do their high school work in Kenya, they have opportunity to move out into the culture and to learn cross-culturally what the needs are. And they carry this into their adult life and through their training, and they end up coming back with us. I have no figures to show how many Africa Inland Mission children go with other missions. Our computer isn't set up to tell us this, but I'd be interested. But we literally have sent out hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of missionaries right from our own family. My daughter went to Kenya, worked at that school at the Rift Valley Academy School for eight years, and she's living with us on furlough right now. Now, I would say that there are many people coming out for short term. We send about 115 people to the field every year for a short term experience, and that can be anywhere from two weeks to eight weeks up to a year. And we have about 65% of those people coming back for longer terms of service. Our most effective tool right now is a program called Timor Training and Missionary Outreach, which puts a team of about 12 missionaries out into an uneven Angeles village where they will learn the language and the culture.

 

They are separated one from each other. They're separated by twos all over that village. They try to communicate as little as possible with each other as they're learning the culture and the language. This is the way it was done 100 years ago. And then they are trying to plant a church in that village. Every one of our teemo teams, I think there have been 14, has been successful in planning a church in that two year. So it's a matter of just getting in there. And that's and incidentally, 75% of those that graduate from that two year program come to us full time, full term. So it's hard to give you an average figure. A lot of a lot of people go out there and say, well, I want to go out there. A term is four years. Normally, I did two five year terms. I don't recommend that four years is quite long enough. In the stress of Africa because you lose contact with your family. Use contact with your supporting constituency. And I think you ought to be back here. My daughter took no furlough for eight years and she came back, came home, burned out, and now she's on extended leave because of it. So I really recommend there's a time to unless, like Amos and Andy used to say, just on LAX, come on. That kingfish just on legs. And I think it's important for us to understand that God made us in a certain way, shaped us in a certain way, and we can take so much attention before we snap. And Africa is filled with tension today that we give to God. And let's face it, the Lord, the joy of the Lord is our strength. That's the only way we get anything done.

 

So I think individually, you have to make that decision of how long you're going to be committed for. We have families going out for just one term for years. We have a lot of seniors going out right now. They're going out for the last 15 years of their life. They want they've made money here in the United States. They've been very successful in business. And now they're going out for ten or 15 years to glorify God and build a church. And they have been very, very successful. I don't play God for anybody, and I don't let anybody else play God for me. So when you asked me a question directly, I try to give you as transparent an answer as I can. I just don't know what an average would be. But we have many missionaries out of our 850 missionaries who are out there long term at our retirement establishment in Clermont, Florida, outside of Orlando. The average age there is something around 85. So there are missionaries who have given their entire lives, you know, to serving the Christ. I recommend it. After all, that's what God called us to obedience. Any other question? I only have three more minutes. At least that's all the doctor's giving me. Yes. Are there situations where is there a time when it becomes too dangerous? I have two examples. A very close friend of mine. I'm a member of the Scripture Truth Foundation, and we support missionaries all over the world in that foundation. One of those is Ted Sugimoto. He is a Japanese-American. He is a very, very fine surgeon. And because it became difficult to work in the Congo at Indian Country, he put his family outside in Kenya and he just went in for five and six weeks at a time to do his work.

 

Now, with the destruction of the medical center, Dr. Sugimoto and his family are going to Ghana. There are first missionaries in West Africa and he's going up there to represent us in a new thrust in our work. The second example just two weeks ago. The second and third of American expatriates were murdered in the night in this country, which I cannot name. I can't tell you where. I can't tell you the country, except it is a muslim, a limited access country. We have eight people in that country and we withdrew them. They're in Nairobi now praying about how to approach this thing and probably will work with Muslims in the area of Nairobi for the next little bit. But there comes a time God is not called you to walk on the edge of the cliff. You are responsible for your family. And we try to make responsible decisions in regard to the danger that missionaries are facing. Now, please understand that here we were caught in the middle of the rebellion and we were brand new. And so we follow the advice of the older missionaries who said this has nothing to do with the white presence. This has everything to do with tribal warfare, people getting back at the national government because Patrice Lumumba was murdered and and he was murdered. He was under the care of the United Nations troops handcuffed to a jeep, and he was murdered. Moist John Bay came to the presidency because of that. So these people were getting back four years later. 1960 was when the country was born June 30th, and now this was 1964 and the country was rising up. That's why it was important that they take the area that we lived in, Kisangani, because Patrice Lumumba was born there.

 

Part of their message was that Patrice Lumumba was going to rise from the dead and he was going to lead them to victory against the national government. It didn't happen. It's not going to happen to Jesus Cups either. So there there is that responsibility that we have. All right. Could you talk about the Africa independent churches? Yeah, sure. Okay. The Africa Independent Church is huge. Now, I think it's important to know why. As an historian, I feel that we must respond to why there are some of us who knew that Yugoslavia was not a monolithic country before it divided. Some of us knew that. But most Americans thought Yugoslavia was Yugoslavia. There were several interests within that that were only held together by a very powerful dictator who was able to reach out and to slap people who didn't behave themselves. Well, in Africa you have the Africa Independent Church, which was born of the fact that our church, our evangelical church, was very, very slow in contextualizing the gospel. And they had all of their African culture, which we were basically refusing. Let's just call us for the moment fundamentalists. We were we were just in a fundamentalist vein. We were just refusing the culture. As on the other side of the spectrum, Roman Catholicism was blessing the whole of the culture, the demon worship and all of the rest. We were at the other extreme. Oh, I'm in the middle. I believe that the myths of Africa, I believe that the Proverbs of Africa, I believe the culture of Africa contains much that we can use to further the church and to make it African rather than a copy of our North American church. God has not called us to change culture. Now, this formation of the Africa Independent Church movement goes way back to the thirties.

 

One of the first large groups are the combined wrists who were in my country of Congo. If anybody wanted someone for a job where you had to have integrity and trust, everybody wanted to hire a combined twist. Why? Because they could be trusted. They had dignity. They had integrity. Now, the gang banger combined was now number over 7 million in several different countries in Africa. But they took the gospel and they pulled it down. They were conscientious objectors. That's how they got the attention of the world. They refused to take up arms. Therefore, they would not go into the army. So in the 1930s, when Simon King Bongo was still alive, he was thrown into what would be considered a concentration camp. All King Mbugua were put in these camps to keep them isolated from the rest of the population. But they just kept growing, even in the camps. The fact is that they worship very, very simply. But they worshiped the same Jesus that you have. But in a way which was completely African. They don't meet in in walled buildings. They meet with buildings without walls. You know, they have something over your head so the sun doesn't give sunstroke to people going to long services. When they have communion, they don't use grape juice. I don't know where we ever get that idea anyway. They use banana juice, but they make banana bread for the wafer. And it is very African. I mean, why not? I mean, how does this going to affect your faith? There are a great many liberal tendencies within the movement to push it off. So that's synchronistic. And it takes more of the African way of life than it should. But the fact is, the core the center are Christians like you and who love the Lord Jesus and who try to live out the life of Jesus in love and in service to their countries.

 

The King banquets are one of the best examples. But you go down to South Africa and there are certain of the groups down there that are absolutely crazy. I mean, you talk about syncretism and they're growing all the time. They meet in a building. They parade. They dance around a pole, a center pole in a building. And they keep harambee emulating, not unlike the Muslims at the Kaba, where they just keep going around and around the Kaaba in Mecca. And they keep going and going and going faster and faster and faster. And what they're doing is the energy that they are projecting is going up that pole to heaven and they're communicating with God that way. We have a tribe in Namibia, that tribe, whenever they have a central church council, they always have it around a great bonfire In their history. That bonfire called the ancestors to take part in the deliberation of the council. That was a Christian. We can't do that. We can't call the ancestors. They're gone. Is appointed unto man once to die. And after that, the judgment. I mean, there's clear verses in the Scripture, but they don't know the scriptures that well. And so they're moving a great deal in a synchronistic way into claiming the things they understand and they understand this thing of the ancestors, because there is there is a continuum between pre-birth and after death. After death. You have the living dead. They're not gone. They're the living dead. And they take part in the history of a tribe. And so there is a there's a wonderful continuum that takes place, very much a family continuum. So to them, family is important to most Americans. Our families have become atomic. We don't even let grandparents live with us anymore.

 

You know, it used to be that way in the old days. But nowadays we have our own affairs. We don't even hear sometimes about how our brothers and sisters are doing. You know, particularly here in the north and the south, it's different. The south. You still have family council. My wife is the oldest of seven children, so she's sort of the the head is being the eldest. She is the head of the family council. And they talk over family matters. But this is disappearing quickly from America. What about your country, sir? Does that still exist? Four generations in his house. So this is the way I think God meant it to be in Africa. We say if you have a guest in your home, you have great riches. And when you have a person with no teeth in your home, that person is a blessing because of what they've learned, what they've learned, You know, the wisdom, the wisdom of the past can save us from a lot of pain. Now, is there any particular direction you wanted me to go with that? Yes, because I think it's important we mention it. It is mentioned in the readings, but not much information. Oh, that's too bad, because there are some good books on the Zimbabwe movement where you can study it. The Zionist group in South Africa. They're very, very interesting group. South Africa is very, very complicated place to work. We don't work in South Africa per se. We work in Russia too, and we work in Namibia. But in South Africa you have two tribes, the Zulu and the Hausa. The hosts are a little over 6 million. The Zulu are about six and a half million people, and they dislike each other so much that they can't even work together in the mines.

 

And traditionally you always send down a social group x, h0sa, and you send them down in the mines and when they come out, then you send the Zulu group down into the mines because in the dark they would kill each other. The Zulu are the late arrival. I'm sure some of you know about Shaka Zulu and the late arrival of this very warrior tribe that came from the north of Africa and then swept down the east coast of Africa, defeated everyone that got in their way. And finally the British had to make agreements with them to let them into South Africa so that they're the late arrivals. So everywhere you go, there's a whole story in whatever country you are of the history and why things are like they are. The Russians say they have a proverb that says, If you think only of the past, then your eyes should be torn from your head. The Russians have very violent proffers. You know, I'm a student of Dostoyevsky and Tolstoy and Gorgon, even Gogol. But and it's true, they vary. But if you do not know the lessons of the past, you're condemned to commit the same mistakes. Santayana brought that to our attention, the Spanish philosopher. And it's still true today. We must know the past so that we don't make those same mistakes moving up into the future. Thank you for your tolerance. And thank you, Dr..