Samuel and David Visit Angola

Angola is a very large country in south west Africa with a population of about 37 million people. Portuguese is the main language of the country. It is a country rich in natural resources including oil and diamonds, but like many other African countries these incredible blessings are exploited and channelled into the hands of a few especially those in the western world.

After arriving we met with the Every Home for Christ team which is led by brother Emmanuel and his wife Jackie.

Recently the Revival Movement Association printed Portuguese New Testaments, so we took with us in our luggage 75 copies and a supply of “Why Jesus” booklets all in Portuguese. When we unpacked the New Testaments there was tremendous excitement among the team as Bibles and New Testaments are extremely scarce in Angola. A person on the minimum wage would have to work for two months in order to be able to purchase a Bible. Last year when we met Brother Emmanuel at a conference he talked to us concerning the needs of Bibles, so the New Testament will be a huge blessing to the church in Angola. We have agreed to print for him 30,000 New Testaments in the next shipment to Angola.

That evening, a minibus was loaded with Gospel Literature, food to be given out to the poor and shoes for distribution along with the whole team. Around 6 o’clock in the evening we set off for the city of Huambo. This journey was expected to take about 12 hours,.However, as a bridge had collapsed, the minibus had to take a detour with the result that we did not arrive until 11 o’clock the next morning. As we arrived at the church a choir was outside singing a welcome to us. When we went in there were about 40 Pastors and Evangelists waiting for us.

These are all partners working with Every Home for Christ, distributing the literature in their region. They gave us a great welcome and different speakers expressed their thanks and appreciation for the gospel literature that they already had received and they were looking for fresh supplies. A consignment was unloaded from the minibus and literature was given to all of these friends who had gathered. We are so thankful to see Pastors and Evangelists who have a burden and vision to reach their own people with the Gospel. After a meal, we started out on another journey which lasted another nine hours, so we arrived in the city of Banguela around midnight.

The next morning Emmanuel had organised for two jeeps to pick us up, and some other local pastors joined our team to travel to a village. They took with them food to give out and also shoes for distribution with another supply of gospel literature. This journey took us over 2 hours on the main road. Then we turned off the main road onto a dirt road with road conditions which we had never seen before. Somehow the jeeps managed to navigate, although at one stage both jeeps got stuck in mud. We went through deep water and eventually arrived in the village. The entire village had congregated under a large tree, and again we were greeted with much singing, excitement and joy from the people.

As the service commenced, the chief from the village spoke to make us welcome. Both of us had to take part in the service, which meant that the English was translated into Portuguese, and then the Portuguese was translated into the Umbango language. Most people can read Portuguese but cannot read their local language. We enquired as to how the team had picked this particular village, and we learned that a member of the Every Home for Christ team came from this village so his parents still lived in the village with some other family and friends. Last year they had come into the village and had distributed Gospel tracts. Since then a Christ group had been formed for new converts and this year would be the second visit to the village. It is hoped to establish a church in the village and then to be able to spread the Gospel by using this village as a base to reach many other villages.

We were amazed at one stage during the service to see a large tarpaulin being put on the ground, we were then instructed to stand in front of it with the other leaders to receive the offering that people brought. People had evidently come prepared to give but it was not cash. Instead people brough big bunches of bananas, maize, flour, sugar cane, peanuts in their shells and other items that they wished to donate.

Emmanuel preached a Gospel message which was then translated into the local language. After this an altar call was made and many people came forward to say that they wanted to trust the Lord to be their Saviour. After this Gospel tracts were distributed to the people and we had a good supply of children’s tracts with us, so we were delighted to be able to give these to the boys and girls while the adults received other titles. Emmanuel told us that he had met some people who were still holding onto the tract that they had received the year previously. We then presented the chief of the village with one of the New Testaments that we had brought. The team are thrilled that this man is so open and welcoming along with the other Elders in the village. Often the chief of these villages is not welcoming.

After the service food was distributed to the poor and also shoes were given to some of the people who really needed new footwear. Clearly the local people had organised a list of names who were to receive food and shoes. Towards the end of this work we were quickly told that we had to pack up and get back into the jeep as a thunderstorm was approaching. The drivers wanted to get out of the village and over the bad roads before the storm hit. However we were only 15 minutes out of the village when the thunderstorm struck and the road became a complete torrent of mud and water. We slid this way and that way but our driver was extremely good and experienced so we managed eventually to get to the main road and back to the city.

The next morning we met up with some of the local pastors and young people who had agreed to do some door-to-door visitation with the Gospel literature. We went to a church in Benguela which was established about 10 years ago. However, they’re still building at the church, but were very keen to visit in the area. Firstly we met with the young people and had the opportunity to speak to them. Then supplies of literature were given to each one and we set off in small group, just across from the church.

A group of young guys with motorbikes were all sitting under a little canopy, this is where you come if you want to get a taxi bike ride somewhere. The thing that amazed us the most was the willingness of people to talk. These young guys talked and asked questions for about 10 minutes. Then we moved on to the local shop and again the customers in the shop started to ask questions. The Gospel was explained to them and nearly at every home that we visited it took about 10 minutes each for questions to be answered, and the Gospel explained. There was a tremendous openness to receive the Gospel tracts. People assured us that they would be reading the tracts, and some also said that they would come to the church on the following Sunday. This shows just how open people are to receive the Word of God.

The next day we were to travel back by bus to Luanda city and this was to be a nine hour journey. After driving a couple of hours the driver pulled up and announced that the road was flooded, it turned out that there had been a flash flood and even though it was not raining this flood had just hit the bridge that we were to cross. The flood water rose very rapidly over the next couple of hours, but eventually by evening the water level dropped again, even though the main road was now badly damaged we were eventually able to cross the bridge. For us to have made a detour it would have been a 12 hour journey. Thankfully we arrived in Luanda around 2.00 am. One big lesson that we were learning was the difficulty local missions, and Evangelists have while travelling throughout the country. Infrastructure within the country is extremely poor and good roads are very scarce. This makes the challenge of travel very unpredictable.

On Sunday we went to a new church that Brother Emmanuel started about five months ago. We were encouraged to see about 40 young people attending this church. They were still working on the building and had no musical instruments, amplification, or fans but they could sing at the top of their voices when worshipping and praising the Lord. During our visit we travelled for many hours and yet we only covered a small area of the country - as we chatted with Emmanuel he shared with us an important aspect of our visit that we had not realised. The reason why he took us to the different cities to meet the partners was that our visit was such an encouragement to them as they struggled through many difficulties in order to win souls for the Lord Jesus Christ. This was the first time anyone from the West had visited their ministry. He told us that this visit would be talked about for a long time by the people and that everything that we had shared would be told to many others that we did not meet. We told them that there were many Christians at home who did care for them and who had a vision for reaching the people of Angola with the Gospel.

On our last day, we met with brother Issac, who is the new leader of the CEF in Angola. He told us a little about the work and needs for CEF flashcard Bible lessons and other literature for the ministry of reaching boys and girls in Angola with the Gospel. We had already sent him a supply of flashcard Bible lessons last year, but he said that these had only supplied workers in three of the states in Angola.

That evening he took us out to visit a Good News Club which was in one of the slum areas of Luanda city. It was quite an experience to walk through the area and then arrive at a door, which opened into a form of courtyard, inside many boys and girls were seated on a row of blocks.

At this stage it was almost entirely dark, but with some torches, we were able to see the boys and girls and experience the Good News Club. The children prayed and sang choruses, had a children’s Bible lesson, a missionary story and other children’s activities. We were really encouraged to see this Ministry going on by these faithful workers.

After this, we went with the whole Every Home for Christ team to the airport. We would like to thank brother Emmanuel and the team for looking after us so well, but also by giving us a vision and a burden for the people of Angola. They are in great need for more literature, especially for the children and also for the New Testament for new believers. Please pray for these friends as they have a vision and are dedicated to reaching the people of Angola with the Gospel message and please pray that we in turn will be able to help them with much more Gospel Literature.