I just got through reading the following article regarding the teaching that is taking place among the Mwinika in Mozambique. What an encouragement to press on through these days of transition with the goal of joining the team in Southeast Africa. Thanks for your prayers for us and the Mwinika these days!
This article was posted by Ian Fallis on March 31st
Last week’s Bible lessons were intense, and this week’s bring the Mwinika people to a decision point.
To this point, evangelistic Bible lessons have been well attended. “Rather than the novelty dimming and people losing interest, more and more people want to go and hear God’s Word,” wrote Francois and Nadia Hattingh. “The local man who has the highest religious authority in our community has continued to go to the teaching. Praise God! He has listened to all the lessons on the MP3 that he has missed.”
“Another influential family leader who we have been encouraging to go, but has not done it yet, asked for the MP3 with the lessons and he and his family listened to it all over the weekend,” Francois and Nadia wrote.
The lessons last week about Cain and Abel and then Noah stirred things up a bit.
“Heavy! That is the word needed to describe week five,” wrote Phil Henderson, one of Francois and Nadia’s co-workers. “We were trying to develop the idea that we are all born outside of the Garden, separated from God and without hope apart from God’s promised Redeemer.”
It worked.
“This week the reality of that separation started to sink in,” Phil wrote. “Many people were visibly shaken during the teaching sessions as they realized the serious personal implications of what we have been telling them.”
That’s been clear from the way people have wanted to talk with the missionaries after the lessons.
“These last few days we have been having some good conversations as we stand around talking after the lesson is over. We have been peppered with questions as people begin to realize the implications of what we are saying,” Phil wrote.
And a man who has been helping the Hendersons around the house recently told Phil’s wife, Elin, that he cannot sleep, so she asked him why.
“How can we sleep when we are hearing these things? We know we are in trouble. We all do those things that the people in Noah’s time did,” he replied.
This week could be even heavier.
“We are approaching a story where the official belief of the predominant religion in our area takes a major detour from the biblical story,” Phil wrote. “The issue is over which of Abraham’s sons was the chosen one.”
The lessons so far have made clear that God cannot accept what people do. We must come to God in God’s way. “It is an insult to God to offer Him what we do in our own effort. He wants us to trust in what He does for us, not in what we can do for Him,” Phil wrote.
God promised Abraham a son, and Abraham trusted him. But as Abraham and Sarah aged, they decided God needed help.
That human effort led to the child who is seen in the traditional Mwinika religion as the chosen one, but that’s not what the Bible teaches, so it’s not what Phil will be teaching.
“Please pray for these lessons this week,” Phil wrote.