2006 Rensford African Trip Reports

These updates start life as emails back to home, then get a little reworked later. All photos are hyperlinked to full-sized ones for your discretionary viewing....

2007 Trip #1 April/May Trip #2 Oct/Nov

19/4/07 Update after Mozambique

We had a blessed time coming over re travel connections, luggage, etc. Zimbabwe Glad Tidings churches founder, Richmond Chiundiza (and his wife, Grace) preached at our church the Sunday we were prayed for and sent off. Because we had so much electrical gear this time (much of it weighty - plus the new data projector I bought as a teaching aid), our cabin luggage was way up, but at every stage we got through without a hassle.

A couple of "visitors" saying they were from the "Dept of Immigration" arrived on motor bikes at the gate asking to see Brian George Rensford. Asking after my health and had I settled in ok. Ishumairi was with me and we ended up having a time of brief fellowship after I said, "ndiri Mufundisi" (I am a minister). And one of them said he was a Christian too and fellowshipped at AFM (a well-known sound Pentecostal church movement). Once they realised we were all serving the Lord, and I had been here several times in missions' work, and we were not concerned about any political stuff, the tension dropped and we farewelled each other.

<<< The trip into Mozambique was a real blessing. Brian did three days of pastors’ seminars at Beira and (for the first time) Nhamatanda (at Sparrows' Nest orphanage which now has an adequate facility for the 60 pastors who travelled for up to 100km). Gavin saw (and smelt) Beira for the first time (and lived!); the condition of some of the electricals we encountered nearly gave him a heart attack (photographic proof provided!)!! >>>

While Brian taught, Gavin and Elizabeth distributed all the gifts our church had so lovingly accumulated and wrapped. It was so moving to be there. There are currently 49 children on site (some 17 y/o’s have been placed in work now and have moved away). There is always more room for prayers, donations, and love! >>>

4/5/07 sent from Bulawayo

Our last week was spent at Gweru / Mkoba. We have completed one really eventful week in the Midlands with an absolute pot-pourri of experiences, high spots and low spots….

<<< We drove out of our way to see Peter Banda (Lifeline network leader) and Simon Smith (Mr Makonde Motors!). Peter accompanied us to Gweru enroute to Botswana.

Gavin and Brian did tag teaching for four days with the Lifeline students. 15 are doing the current course, and the change in hours (to afternoons) has enabled more experienced Christians to attend. They have been very hungry to learn. We also distributed 4000 copies of CEF children’s Bible stories (for ages around 10-12), compliments of Alan Graham, our Child Evangelism Fellowship contact in Harare

Tuesday was a public holiday, so Lifespring Church’s leadership spent half a day with us three in a hands-on look at local church leadership – what is it about, and what can we all learn? Addmore says it was an excellent day for his people. Lots of practical areas were covered about what our local church at home does about “normal” church-life stuff.

ALL IN A DAY’S WORK…

But Wednesday took the cake… What a day… It started out with our first owl at 4am. Uh oh, we are being watched by the powers (this has happened before to us; it’s a common occurrence here in Zimbabwe, where the n’angas use owls for spirit observation – and please don’t scoff at home). We three started out on our usual prayer walk around 6.30am, and passed through several areas on the edge of this part of Mkoba. Flash Harry (aka shutterbug Gavin) took photos of lots of (to him) unusual sights – nothing too sensational, like a kiosk shop. About two hours later, two CIO agents (secret police) called at the house we are staying in and enquired as to who we were and what were we doing taking photographs in the township. Our host and Brian explained who we are and what Lifeline does, and that we were here on Lifeline serving ministry, and that Gavin was only taking photos for his family as a first-time visitor to their beautiful country. They went away assuring us everything was ok. In next week’s township, we will make sure the police and CIO are notified of our presence when we arrive, as we are mainly in township areas where the presence of any white person is unusual.

Then later in the morning, after a series of quite amazing circumstances, Brian [with three other pastors] had a private meeting with the Governor of Midlands Province! He is the Zimbabwe Government’s senior representative for the Midlands province (with some 2m+ people under his care). Governor Msipa is in his 70’s and has a reputation for being fair-minded and sound in his governance. He informed Brian he was a Church of Christ member who had met with many Church of Christ leaders from Australia over the years. And he gave his personal assurance that he would help to expedite any goods, resources, etc, we wanted to send from Australia to Gweru and the Midlands, and gave Brian authority to use his name to help any process involved. He then sent us to the ZIMRA (customs) senior representative nearby who very courteously laid out the process by which goods can be imported duty-free for religious purposes. We praised God for this amazing series of events, which could prove very, very beneficial in the long run for bringing in all kinds of ministry resources, etc.

Then, In the early afternoon, Gavin was holding forth for the first two hours of the Ministry Training Program (and doing very well by the students’ feedback), while Brian preached at the lunchtime workers’ chapel service in Gweru run by the SU representative for the Midlands. This was the 2nd of 4 in a brief series. The numbers surprised him, with some 200 showing up. They were greatly amused at times by his “Shonglish”!

Then back to Mkoba to complete the days MTP material, highlighted by a 62 y/o “student” being baptised in the Holy Spirit. He was from a Presbyterian Reformed background, and desperately wants to be water baptised as well, to the horror of his minister, who refuses to do it. Pastor (Nicolas!) Mugabe was also filled with the Holy Spirit..

The low-light for such an eventful day? Well, you may not stomach this too well, but it has been a very hard week by home standards…. The best way to let you know what we have been through here is to tell it like it is. For starters, we are staying up on the highest area of Mkoba, so that means when the rest of the 40,000+ residents are using water, there’s none here (locals stole the pipes from the reservoir to the system). It runs only from 2am until 4.30am, so our dear host (Betty Ncube) gets up every morning at 2am and fills every bucket and pail in the house – for the bathing, dishes, washing, and toilets. She has to work so hard.

This means we “bathe” continental-style! Using a small dish of warm water. And that’s all! For your entire body, then any garments… Elizabeth washed her hair in the garden! We already mentioned she was struck down by an acute appendicitis-type stomach pain. In bed by 7pm (we are all to bed by 9pm and up at dawn each day).

But the grottiest experience of doing it hard for the gospel went to Brian. Rule #1 of missions’ activity in the Third World is ALWAYS carry a roll of toilet paper with you! Brian forgot on Wednesday… When he had to obey the call of nature urgently while teaching, and went to the toilet, he discovered not only was there no toilet paper (there is never any toilet paper in any public amenity loo – it gets stolen – as do the seats often), but the water was off as well! This may not mean much to our readers, but in the Third World, if you forget your dunny paper, you have to resort to the ahem!... traditional left-handed method of you-know-what – then rinse THOROUGHLY!!! No water then is a crisis! In desperation, he tore the cistern lid off - to discover that God had graciously preserved about 15 cm of water in the bottom of it – just enough to come out smelling sort-of ok….. Nothing a good scrub on getting back to the Lifeline house wouldn’t fix…

Gavin Watts adds - Greetings to all from the cool climate of Mkoba the weather changes quite a lot in a day. Reminds me of Melbourne. [Mkoba pastors' day-seminar >>> ]

[ <<< Addmore's children gave up their rooms for us]. We have been well looked after by our hosts but the household facilities in theses areas are not like what we are used to but this house is better than many we see.. God’s grace has been with us in the teaching sessions that we are holding in a room in a local school. There have been about 10-12 students per session and they are keen to learn. Many of them have to get time off work to attend. This is a great sacrifice when you hardly earn enough to live and you do not get paid time off. The need for teaching in this area is obvious as you walk around and see so many churches here. Next to the school where we are teaching there are two different church buildings side by side. Twice I have found students reading religious material they have been given that are from cult groups. They have been unaware of what is behind the group or that they are wrong teachings.

Please pray for Elizabeth as she was diagnosed as having acute appendicitis tonight (Friday am Sydney time). While the emergency doctor assured us she is not about to have it burst, he recommended surgery in Bulawayo in a couple of days time. We drive there today (Friday May 4), and will see the medical people straight away. The timing of this is so typical of what we face EVERY TIME we come into this spiritual war zone. Why do we do it? Only because we believe we are walking in His purposes, AND having a beneficial effect on the lives of many dear brothers and sisters here. Otherwise, we would be home tomorrow, safely tucked into our comfort zone.

11/5 from Plumtree

Most importantly, E is ok, but still has appendix pain - not too severe now, and she is on a course of antibiotics. We intend to wait now until we get home before she does anything. Thank everyone for their prayers. We had a wonderful and full day with George’s church yesterday - 3 hours of MTP training; then 3 hour meeting (very anointed), then 90 minutes of discussion with George and Cosmos re the future of Lifeline. I was exhausted (E stayed at Mick's) and without Gavin sharing the teaching sessions, I would not have coped with the load the past two weeks and three weekends. He has been PREACHING WITHOUT NOTES⁄!!!

We are in Plumtree, where it is very, ahem, basic! But, the main thing is Elizabeth’s health has improved. She says swallowing 12 pills a day is almost as bad as having appendicitis! But, it looks as though she will make it home in one piece fro a real doctor’s examination.

The numbers in this conference (which runs for five days from 9-4) have been way down on their expectations. Only 35 attended today (they were expecting 60). It seems to Cosmos and me that the locals did not factor in the level of spirit resistance we have encountered all along the way. Several elderly Methodist ministers attended (up to 84 y/o!! >>> ), as well as leaders of the Zionist cult - amazing; they stayed for the entire five days and opened up to the issue of OT ritual being superseded by Christ's sufficiency in the NT.

We just had a phone call from Gavin to say he was still alive, even though their vehicle was a mere 2m from a bull elephant at one point! He had an awesome time with Sam – one-on-one guiding!

The African “walk by faith” is tested every day in ways we don’t always see at home, let alone the frequency! For instance, I dropped Kefas’s loaned phone during our 40 minute prayer walk out from Plumtree at 7am this morning. John knows where we walked last year. I didn’t realise it until 8am, prayed, got in the HiLux and drove back to the exact spot where I “suspected” it might be, and didn’t even have to get out of the vehicle to pick it up…. Tinotenda, Jesu!

There are no ceilings yet in the bedrooms in our hosts house, so every noise still carries! It is like being in one big room only you can’t see the others! No farting, snoring, or anything else….

Our presence here was reported to the Police and CIO ahead of arrival by the President of the Ministers' Fellowship – this helps keep everyone on side.

Then it was back to Bulawayo and George Moyo's wonderful church (Breakthrough) for a second weekend of teaching and preaching. Their amazing choir blessed us as much as we ministered to them! This photo was their Mothers' Day. celebration...>>>

18/5/07 from Beitbridge

G’day, everybody. We are due to drive later today back to Harare after three weeks in the Midlands and South. We have been working with the local Ministers' Fellowship in each of the three townships, and so much of what we have grown and learned through our own Ministers' Fellowship has been so helpful here. Two places ran a FIVE day 9.30 to 4pm seminar! In Beitbridge (the toughest and hottest place in Zimbabwe – at the South African border – full of cross-border traders, thieves, and prostitutes), the chairman said the most they ever get to any function is 10 ministers, and he was overjoyed when 35 attended! I (Brian) had a great liberty in the Word, and taught three sessions a day + a free for all every day for the last hour!

We have seen strange things from God this trip, not the least of which has been the attendance of leaders from the Zionist and Apostolic cults (who use manipulative prophecy to keep their followers in line). These groups also utilise elements of spiritualism, yet as we pressed hard on the authority of Scripture, they expressed a desire to move into mainstream Orthodoxy. This is staggering! Something we have never seen before (or heard of either)!

Thank the Lord my voice lasted really well, and our health has been generally fine (with the exception of Elizabeth’s appendicitis (now settled down 100% - it looks like it was a “Zimbabwean health problem”….). Both of us have been continually tired as we have stayed in homes where people come and go all hours of the night. You wake up to find there are bodies sleeping on the lounge carpet! Praise God for earplugs! At Beitbridge, the mossies bit through the sheet (so hot there you couldn’t use a blanket). Praise God for malaria tablets!

Elizabeth is saying to me as I type this she can survive over here as long as she has warm water to wash in, and can put on clean clothes! Is this too much to ask for!?!? Well, with the increasing level of power cuts, even this is “luxury”! And the plastic basins seemed to shrink as the trip went on....

We have not had a “rest” day since we and Gavin came back from Mozambique almost four weeks ago. Looking forward to spending three days on our own once we get to South Africa – Derick and Collette Dove are arranging something for us.

25/5/07 Final Update from South Africa

We arrived in Joburg earlier this week - leaving Harare at 25c to hit Joburg at -3c overnight! Our blood froze! A record cold weather snap (with snow on the hills) sent us into to the shops to buy gloves!!! The cold went into our bones…

Our final days in Zimbabwe were spent recovering from the quite exhausting three weeks solid in the South. And catching up on Lifeline friends and correspondence. We don’t comment much on the economic and political aspects of the nation because of the politically sensitive nature of such commentary – and the possible consequences. But, we can say that for people not involved in the political area of life, the place is as delightful as ever to stay in, travel around, communicate with locals, and see God’s amazing hand of provision constantly at work.

For locals however, the spiralling inflation (now over 2200% - or 6% per day!) is creating enormous problems as they struggle to keep up in real wage terms. People are hurting everywhere, and our hearts go out to them continually. It’s very easy to be overpowered by he current situation – you feel so helpless. But we are reminded of the story of two men walking along a beach where a large school of fish had been stranded by the outgoing tide. The man in front kept stopping and throwing one back into the channel. When the second man caught up with him, he asked, “what on earth are you doing?”. To which the first man replied, “I think it’s pretty obvious”. “Yes, but there are so many”, he said. The first man slowly said, “true, but it sure made a difference to those ones!”

So we continue to go, to fix shoes, bind up Bibles, and above all teach the basics of godly Christian living and true prosperity. And to the “few” we encounter (some we have known now for several years), our church and supports' “little” HAS made a difference!

Derick and Collette Dove arranged a three-day break for us 70km away from Joburg in a rural area. It’s freezing! But yesterday we spent most of the day at a nearby 1400 hectare rhino and lino park; it was interesting – the highlight being the colony of African painted wild dogs – a very endangered species. They were a delight to observe! White rhino weight-watchers recovery group >>>

This Sunday, we are ministering at Derick and Collette’s home church for both services. We catch up with John Curtis’s South African family members on Monday, do some ministry again Wednesday (but this is nothing like our Zimbabwean schedule!), and then fly home Thursday! Roll on the day! See you all soon, much love from Brian and Elizabeth.

SECOND 2007 TRIP 14/10/07 Update #1 - From Chinhoyi

BEN WRITES: G’day to our Christian family from Harare. We hope you are all well in Sydney. We arrived in Harare last night after a two hour stopover in Joburg. The flight went smoothly and we even flew over pack ice from Antarctica. Brian didn’t waste any time in ministering to the Zimbabweans as we sat next to a young Zimbabwean man on our flight to Harare. He had a part-Greek background, grew up in Zim and now lives in the U.S.A and was very open to the gospel. Brian was able to share some of his testimony to him. We found out his mother is involved in a church in Harare that Brian has ministered at in the past and obviously she had been praying for him.

Our customs’ experience at Harare airport was interesting. One of our suitcases didn’t show up, but we were told it was coming on the next flight which wasn’t far away. So we attempted to go through customs and the officer started asking questions and looked as though she was going to search all our gear - until we told her there was still one more to arrive. So we were sent off to wait until all our bags had arrived and then to go through to have our luggage checked. Thank God for delaying one bag as when it did arrive we went to a different customs officer that waved us straight through without examination or interrogation.

We stayed with Peter and Cherie Irish in Harare who have been very gracious and hospitable. It’s a bit of a culture shock having a maid and I (Ben) felt very uneasy at first… having someone else around to serve you breakfast and clean up; I felt the need to help but apparently this makes them feel threatened as that is what they are being paid to do. Agnes is very nice anyhow. (Cherie Irish and Ben at CC's coffee shop >>>)

BRIAN CONTINUES: Before we left Harare, we went out to the airport customs (after having to park on the roadside while a high-level Presidential cavalcade roared past us at high speed. We had been told from Oz that the 60kg of resource library books we packed and delivered to our Qantas contact had been placed on our flight. However, we found out here they are still on Joburg! What else is new? So, we can’t take them with us to Gweru, but will have to pick them up later.

Peter Irish is an executive with Kingdom Bank, and invited us to share at the Bank HQ’s lunchtime chapel meeting on Friday. We were very warmly received, and Ben got his first request for his email address! Which he wisely declined….

Fuel is very scarce; breakfast cereals, flour and dairy products are almost non-existent (and if present, came in from South Africa and are very expensive), but fruit and vegies, and chicken are plentiful, so we have had a change of diet since arriving! We both should lose weight before we get home!! The Irishes took us to a Portuguese restaurant tonight where the entire menu was Portuguese chicken, garlic, chips, more garlic, some peri-peri, and a side salad, and even more garlic!! We both ponged of garlic the next day!!

18/10/07 Update #2 - from Gweru

We could not access an email connection ourselves anywhere that worked until we came to Gweru. Because the power is off continually everywhere, and you have to try to get on the Net when it’s on. Water is off continually, power is off every day for hours, and everyone operates by candles and gas cookers on standby, and if you can afford one – a generator. It has made things very hard when you are using a notebook computer whose battery is on its last legs! We have to work in the night hours when the power is on… And make sure we boil the thermos too!

I (Brian) was still coming up for air, after two days in Harare when the first email was begun. The Irishes were incredibly kind to us. After we left Harare, we called on the Zulu family in Banket before going to Simon’s at Chinhoyi (120k from Harare). Martha Zulu (widow of my dear friend, Peter) had a number of AIDS orphans gathered outside the gate looking for food. The food situation for these children is continually knife-edge, and Martha tries every day to find food to feed them. It’s awful. I could hardly recognise the Kuwadzana township from what it was like 6 years ago. When the main local white farmer was evicted, most of the township people lost their jobs, now it looks like a slum, and thieving is commonplace.

After ministering in Peter Banda’s Shona church, we went back to Good’s tiny house in the Chinhoyi high-density area. Good has recently moved back there, after some 5 years as the groundsman at the Harare Lifeline Base, because his wife, Maidei, is now 7 months pregnant (it’s very common for a husband to have to live and work away from his family, and is one reason for the AIDS epidemic here). They do some small-trading to make ends meet, but they have no running water in their part of the township; their vegetables are dying, and they could not even offer us a glass of water for lunch! Let alone any food. We have never seen such dire straits here in any previous visit.

We had an excellent time with the Bandas and their church in Chinhoyi, and on our way down to Gweru, visited the pastor who originally sent Kefas Makava (who currently lives with Brian and Elizabeth in Sydney) to the Lifeline program when we first met in 2000 – Moses Mamutse in Chegutu. Moses sends his greetings to Kefas, and we had a good time with him, Sadly, he also mentioned that many of the children they care for have continual diarrhoea through the Water authority’s inability to fund chemicals to properly treat the drinking water – Ben handed over some medicines for the orphanage children they care for (90 at present) and wrote down some dosage details for Moses. He wishes he had brought more medicines for children. We have just missed Jim Bowler when he visited Chegutu last week for a leadership seminar – they had 90 leaders from the network come together.

Zimbabwean Problem – a very large building was begun 7 years ago by the former owner, who could not afford to finish it. Moses’s group purchased the property and later hired a builder to put the roof on, which he did – only he skimped on the size of the trusses, and when the tiles went on, the whole roof began to buckle! Simon Smith supervised the removal of the entire roof, and it is still awaiting reconstruction with adequate trusses…

Ben saw his first troops of monkeys and baboons along the highway. We plan to get him into the Antelope Park and its famous “walk with the lions” attraction…

Since arriving in Gweru, we have shared the Lifeline Ministry Training Program – Ben has been applying some of what he has learned at our own Ministry Development College re presentation and engagement in activity by the students. There are seven who are finishing this year’s program; six are experienced Christians (known already to Brian), and one has been a believer for a year. Sam is 47 and was baptised in the Holy Spirit during Brian, Elizabeth and Gavin’s visit five months ago. They are such a pleasure to teach.

At the same time, I (Brian) have been speaking daily at the Gweru city centre lunchtime chapel. The numbers attending have been between 80 and 120. The zeal for Christ here never ceases to amaze us (and almost all of them seem to have no food for lunch). The local Scripture Union coordinator organises these daily meetings. Morgan Sibanda has been here for 14 years, and was a close friend of Peter Zulu too. He has a great heart for the Body of Christ. He is coordinating next week’s 4-day pastors and leadership seminar for us, that the Baptist Church is hosting. There is an excellent relationship among many of the diverse churches around Gweru / Mkoba, and it is one reason we keep coming back to this district – to assist in a small way in building up the Body of Christ, and its unified witness to the surrounding community.

Weatherwise… It was very hot driving here, but Gweru is “famous” for its winds, and they have constantly kept the temperature down to pleasant levels. But, the mozzies are shocking! With the cessation of spray programs pretty well everywhere in Zimbabwe, there is basically no area totally free from malaria anymore. We have to spray at dusk, put coils on in the bedroom, and spray any part of the body exposed above the sheets….

As ever, our hosts in Gweru (the Wilsons) have smothered us with kindness and assistance. A house of refuge in a swirl of the unusual and the unexpected.

Zimbabwean Problem – At the YWCA facility Lifeline has used for the past 3 years in Mkoba, there was a large shady tree where we would park the truck, and the students would congregate under during the lecture breaks. My heart broke when I saw only a hacked stump this visit. The continual loss of power to heat food is creating a wasteland as an enormous number of trees near residential areas are being hacked down for firewood. It is quite devastating to see. And will take years to recover (if ever)….

Good news came from Harare customs that the 60kg of ministry development resource books we packed at home and sent as unaccompanied baggage has now arrived, and is available for collection. We have also heard that the cost to our church was less than 20% of the normal rate! Courtesy of a very kind and helpful Tabor College student back home, who overheard me (Brian) discussing with a fellow board member the frustration of freighting resources to Africa. And an enormous tinotenda (thank you) to Lynda – our Tabor College librarian – who has faithfully collected books surplus to the College’s library requirements for the past two years for us. They are now beginning to get through to where they will be treasured!

We are well, and enjoying the friendliness of the Zimbabwean people. Western media gives a distorted view of life here. The people we mix with are quite inspirational the way they confront the unending pressure of survival. And it is a safer place to be than Sydney, despite what the Western media projects. The people bless and encourage us not to take for granted any of the privileges we experience living in Aussie, in one of the wealthiest nations in the world. Until next time, Mwari akaropa fadze (God bless you)! Brian (and Ben).

24/10/07 Third Update – from Gweru

This second update started as a short email while the power was on – it’s not on half the time. Nor is the water, so we have come back to Roy and Melodie’s for a couple of hours for a glorious bath and an email send session.

The main seminar we came for is going really, really well. It started with some 60 pastors and leaders in attendance. By day 3 & 4 there were 80 leaders present, including several varungu (white) ministers. The Midlands chairman of EFZ (Evangelical Fellowship of Zimbabwe) attended - a lovely brother and shared his heart to establish a resource centre in Gweru. I was so happy to hear that the Holy Spirit seems to be saying the same thing to several significant leaders, and that the news from home is equally encouraging – Koorong Christian Books is coming to the party with (slightly faulty) bibles, and the shipment of books going through so well. So, things are shaping really well regarding supplying resources to several resource centres for church leaders around Zimbabwe and Mozambique.

The people here have been so kind in such difficult circumstances. We called at Mkoba police station yesterday and Addmore informed them we are here and what we are doing. They were fine with us being here, and we have had no visits from the CIO (secret police) this trip (unlike last time).

The weather has been hot but a cooling wind has kept the temperature down and made the nights quite pleasant. By the way, Ben has been doing an excellent job liaising with people, helping me out, and doing quite a bit of one-on-one and the occasional preaching and teaching stint too. He is exhausted! Please don’t ask him when he gets home if he had a good “holiday”, coz he will brain you!! He is currently trying to stitch up another operation for a 10 y/o abandoned boy who had his broken arm badly operated on and it is now pretty useless. Being a nurse himself, he has got into the hospital and spoken with a respectable surgeon who will do the needed operation for $US600. Another Christian relief group from the USA has offered to cover half of the costs. There are so many ways you can help here, and you feel so inadequate. But the more we get into the local networks, the less risk there is that foreign aid gets ripped off by corrupt middle-men.

More from Ben… Thank you all for your prayers! We are both well and in good health! For the last three days we have been living in the Mkoba township and probably the only white people in the town of over 45 000 people. We are staying in the house Lifeline and our church bought for Addmore and Betty Ncube. It’s a great home in this area. Brian has been running a pastor’s seminar for the past three days which have been well attended and the response has also been good.

On Sunday we went to Addmore’s church that meets in a local high school. Brian preached and many of the children of the church responded to a call to become a Christian, some of them weeping. In the afternoon Brian spoke at a Interdenominational service in the Gweru lyric theatre; it looked like it had been a beautiful building 15 years ago but it was run down when we went. The seats were falling apart and rats were running around on stage. Brian preached well on repenting from sexual immorality and there were a number of young girls who responded to a word of knowledge that they were being pressured by men and needed their will strengthened to say NO! Brian also had a word of knowledge that there was someone there who had injured their eye at work, but no one responded at the time. But then on Tuesday a young man came to the church in Gweru where Brian was doing the pastors’ seminar with the exact problem that had been described. Someone had passed the message onto this brother. We prayed for healing and sent him on his way. He was from a Salvation Army Church.

Then, on Saturday we had a day off and went on safari! We went to the Gweru Antelope Park and it was so refreshing. It was a side of Africa that I hadn’t yet seen, the tourist resort and it was posh! And then there was the wildlife. Lots of it! The owner of the park, an old Rhodie (Rhodesian) only has one arm. I would like to say that he was born that way but no, one night he’d been drinking a bit too much chibuku (beer) and thought that he would have a bit of a play with his pet lion. Unfortunately the Lion wasn’t in the mood and tore his arm off. I think he learnt well from his experience because he gave up the grog and is now a committed Christian in the local Baptist Church.

We had the final lesson of the ministry training program last Friday in Mkoba. Our seven students were so grateful, and really blessed by the gift of food and drink we made to them from some of our Aussie donations – not much in our money when the exchange rate is currently running at $Z1,000,000 to $US1… They were so appreciative for the time we spent teaching the Word, but I think I was more blessed then what they were. One lady, Ambuya (Grandmother) Mavis, read out a thank you speech to us for coming and participating. Because the shops really are empty of processed food and drinks, it was really hard finding anything to buy for them! We have no idea at home what it is like here.

31/10/07 Fourth Update - from Harare

FROM BEN: G’day everybody. Thank you for your prayers as the Lord has really carried us so far on this trip. We hope and pray that you are all well too and walking with our Lord. We arrived in Harare on Monday after an exhaustive (and exhausting!) and fruitful two weeks of ministry in Gweru and Mkoba. The Gweru Pastor’s seminar, which was one of the main reasons Brian wanted to come, was very well attended. In the last two days of the seminar we had in attendance 80 local church leaders, house group leaders, pastors, and even a man that functions as a bishop! (photo attached). Brian really went after the Priesthood of all believers and tore down some of the local false teachings. Then look at the New Testament normative model that enables the Priesthood of Every Believer to function in a local church. We had a number of white pastors attend as well. It was amazing to see the breadth of the body of Christ represented in the attendees. Many were Pentecostal but we also had SDA, Baptist, and even the new Presbyterian minister come. She has replaced Roy Wilson, is very sick (after having a stroke), and approached Brian for personal ministry afterwards. Such a sad lady. We were also able to develop a strong link with the local Baptist minister who hosted the seminar in his well set up church facility. Many Pastors also came from Mkoba.

On the Friday the Lord really began to open the door for the setting up of a resource centre in Gweru. There was a meeting with the Midlands President of the Evangelical Fellowship of Zimbabwe who was keen also to get involved with a resource centre, and some logistics of it were also discussed. The fact that the first 60kg of Christian resources has made it through to Harare along with the willing brothers in Gweru is a good indication that the Lord is really making this happen. Praise God because there is such a need here for good quality material!!!

Over the weekend, Addmore’s Church, Lifespring Ministries, had their second anniversary celebration. It was something the equivalent of our Church camp. Brian ministered alongside an Albino Pastor that only had one eye (lost the other one to skin cancer). His name was Philip (and his wife, Maria); they were wonderful people and we had good fellowship with them as we all stayed at Addmore and Betty Ncube’s house - where the water runs from 2.30 to 5am every morning ONLY!! Betty wakes up when it starts to run and fills every bucket and tub – especially when they had four of us staying for a week (they have three children themselves as well). There was also a laying on of hands as some of the Lifeline students were ordained as deacons.

On Sunday Brian preached at this conference while I went to another small church in Mkoba. The Pastor Artwell did a 4 year theology degree and is fluent in Greek and Hebrew. He tried to make out that since Gavin had preached at his church last visit that it was tradition that Brian's companion ministered at his church. His wife Felisi (a former Lifeline MTP graduate) is a very gifted praise and worship leader and did the best job at this that I have seen in Zimbabwe so far. Three young boys responded to my (Ben’s) message on grace.

Our trip back to Harare on Monday was very exciting, the amount of wildlife we saw just on the side of the road was remarkable! Baboons, monkeys, an enormous ostrich and to top it off, less than 15km from Harare’s city boundary, we stopped and watched for some time three full grown kudu (very large deer) in a field grazing near some dairy cows!! We brought back a lifeline student named Clifford; he’s an older gentleman who had to go to the Malawian embassy. It turned out the embassy is only two doors down from the Lifeline base!!! He had also requested a Bible so we gave him 86 y/o Joyce Rensford’s Study Bible which she had donated. He was so appreciative, as he has quite a teaching gift developing (at 61!). Anotenda, Joyce! (photo attached).

FROM BRIAN: Ben writes so well there’s not much more for me to add. Yes, praise God that the door seems to be opening wider in the Midlands, and I have seen enough already to say the trip was worth the cost and effort. A special thanks to the person in our church who felt led to donate a sizeable gift for transport arrangements. This was very timely and has had a very beneficial effect on what we are doing here. And there’s sufficient to help the Nhamatanda one-day seminar next week and the Beira two-day seminar as well. These leaders are very, very poor and transport (plus our Church’s donations covering a very well catered-for morning tea.

We leave for Beira tomorrow morning for a heavy week of travel and ministry engagements. And then we are on the plane home! Ben has been a great blessing here. We gave him le grande tour of Celebration Centre (the Fords’ home church) today. It makes Hillsong Church’s complex look a bit dated – what with its theme park, restaurant, school, and 29 acres of grounds! He was a bit overpowered by it all! Alas, there appeared to be no photo of the President to be seen anywhere… We had coffee with Cherie Irish at CC’s (she is principal of the Church ACE school), and are using the rest of our day to prepare for the next week.

Classic catch!! - Ben has worked hard at picking up Shona words and has done very well. But there are hidden pitfalls when you go in too hard… He was leading a scenario during a Lifeline class, and meant to say, “can I worship God and still drink Chibuku?” (the cheap Zimbabwean beer sold in a 2 litre bottle called a Scud, because it will blow your head apart!). But he said, “can I worship God and still drink chimbuzi?” Unfortunately, this is the Shona word for toilet! The students rocked at this classic Shonglish faux pas!

A big thanks to everyone, young and old, who has continued to pray for us. So far, we have been very aware of various different ways the enemy has tried to do a Sanballat-type of attack on us, and failed… sneaking up to the walls, claiming to be a fellow traveller, broken sleep patterns, etc, but through the constant prayer support, and keeping spiritually alert ourselves, we have continued to maintain good mental, physical, and spiritual health. And along the way we have met and engaged with many, many people outside of the more organised times of ministry. Some of these one-off encounters have already proven to be very beneficial to the people we have spoken with, prayed for, and ministered to.

For instance, to close with, the Baptist pastor who hosted the 4-day seminar, approached me (Brian) about an area he had battled with re paralysis of will for many years. It turned out he had been under the tutelage of a guru-type cult leader some years ago, who had the ability to stare down people into a fearful, indecisive, paralysed state. We renounced this man’s influence and aberrant teachings in Jesus’ name. As we prepared to leave Gweru, our friends (who know him well and love him a lot – he is a very passionate and warm-hearted pastor) told us, that he had had constant stomach and digestion trouble for many years, and was unable to hold food down without taking regular medication. Some days later, he realised he had not had the pain, nor taken any medication, and had eaten well since we prayed together and broke the spiritual oppression. That’s the good news of the Kingdom, as Christ’s words of hope are accompanied by Christ’s power!

Until we see you all in 10 days, Mwari akaropa fadzei! God bless youse all! from Brian and Timothy (the nickname Morgan Sibanda gave Ben really stuck in the Midlands!).

PS. We have had a few enquiries from people wanting to help. Yes, we do take donations through our church office, and ensure that they are carefully distributed 100% in Africa – no admin or corruption middle-man stuff! Drop me an email if you would like to help, even in a small way.

3/11/07 Fifth update from Beira

Hie, folks. Jeff has set up wireless broadband at the Beira Base! Truly the last shall be first! I am using Loxley's computer as my wireless will not talk to this connection.

A brief summary of our journey into hell... Ben is very ill and please pray for him Sunday. He has got a dose of stomach bug which (please assure Kayleen) will not kill him, but it will sure help him lose some weight! He has been crook for 24 hours. Not malaria or anything else.

He managed to spend one session with the 35 youth leaders who turned up today. I addressed the 17 pastors and other leaders who also came. We had a half day session yesterday (Fri) which was typically shambolic, but got there in the long run.

The weather is amazingly good! The rainy season is late; the breeze wonderful, and the swimming brilliant! Even Loxley has joined us after we finish the ministry!

12 of the youth leaders were baptised in the Spirit today. THAT was truly good news. Tomorrow (Sun), Anacleto wants us to minister in three different churches, but we are not sure Ben will be up to it.

We need your prayers. Sparrows Nest is looking good. Domingos has a car now and a small truck for the new safer vegie garden 44 km from Nhamatanda (5 acres). We spend all day there Tuesday. We are both looking forward to coming home for sure! Love to youse all from Brian and Ben

More from Ben - G’day Church, I hope you are all well and strong in the Lord. We got to Beira safely on Thursday after a very interesting trip. We travelled from Harare to a place call Mutare. The scenery was spectacular with granite poking up out the ground all over the place. Some looked 1km in height. Mutare is 7000ft high and you could feel it in your breathing. This is where the border crossing into Mozambique is. The border crossing was like something out of the movies. Money getting passed around everywhere and because everyone was speaking Portuguese it was hard to tell if they were giving bribes or genuine payments.

As we drove through Mozambique it became apparent that these people were different from the Zimbabweans. We got harassed non-stop when we stopped for lunch in a church grounds. People trying to sell you things and just gain your attention to get money off you. It was funny, just outside Chimoio, we drove past a man wearing a Parramatta Eels T-shirt! It was hilarious - that in the middle of nowhere - here’s this bloke wearing a t-shirt for our local football club. We stopped at Nhamatanda on our way through just briefly to talk to Domingos and I got to meet a few of the orphans.

The same night we got to the Beira base Anacleto wanted me to come with him to pray and see one of the pastor’s working under him who was quite ill. This man had all the symptoms of malaria but said he was feeling better.

On Friday Loxley took me to downtown Beira; we went to the Chemist shop and picked up some extra drugs for Sparrows Nest orphanage. We managed to get urine testing sticks for less then half price because they were out of date but they will still work fine. We also bought some malaria treatment, just in case. It came in handy because Anacleto took me back to the same sick pastor who had gotten worse again. So we started him on a malarial treatment.

I woke up on Friday night at 2:30 with terrible food poisoning, I’ll spare you the details. But then on the Saturday we had the conferences for Youth Leaders and Pastors. I managed to get through 2 sessions with the local youth Pastors, but Brian had to take the third cause I just felt too ill. Thank God he did though because 12 of them were baptised in the Holy Spirit. Praise God!! By Sunday I was feeling better although your continued prayers are appreciated, and today (Monday morning) I managed to go a our daily prayer walk again with Brian.

Later this morning we have further Pastors’ and youth leaders’ seminars, and then on Tuesday we are off to the Sparrows' Nest for the day. Please pray for wisdom for myself as I conduct a clinic for all the kids, while Brian teaches the pastors and leaders.

7/11/07 Sixth Update from Harare before leaving

Hie again, everybody. Brian here. The day spent in Nhamatanda went really, really well, but was incredibly exhausting. It was the toughest day in the four weeks we have had in Africa. The rainy season is about to come; the weather was stinking hot and humid. Ben looked like an AIDS victim, what with two days of food poisoning and then dehydrating all day as he conducted a clinic for as many children as he could cope with. Over 50 children currently in residence; then another 60 pastors and leaders attended for the day to hear Brian and Loxley conduct the seminar. Plus staff... The power went off the night before, so the water pump had failed, and there was almost no water for anyone (let alone the loos!). By 4pm, the "aroma" was pervading pretty well everything!... The goat that was killed for lunch added a certain poignancy to the day, as the ladies beheaded it and bled it in the scorching sun.... Yes, missions' ministry - we love it!

But, thank the Lord, one of the missionaries at the Beira Beach house told us of a new(ish) air-conditioned motel only 35 km from Nhamatanda, and we stayed there that night - three rooms all with a/con blasting away! And an excellent meal! Beats staying at the "Pink Papaya" (where Loxley and Gavin had to share a bed last trip!!).

Next morning, we crossed the border, and headed for a decent breakfast at Wimpy's in Mutare. How wonderful Zimbabwe had become in one short week! Ben was rapt to be back in "civilisation". Africa does that to you, Elizabeth reckons - gets you back to "basic luxuries" - which to her are, running water, some warm water, and a toilet with a toilet seat on it! She said, "that isn't asking for too much, is it?"

Our last morning in Harare was spent packing, and repacking. We passed on Gavin's work's donated notebook to Loxley Ford to be passed on to George, one of the long-term Lifeline network leaders who is becoming computer literate. Brian caught up with Richmond Chiundiza (again - he spoke in our Sydney church the Sunday before we left to come here). And Ben went shopping for souvenirs for his wife (Kayleen) and family members. We flew out with such a sense of fulfilment and accomplishment of what God sent us here for. And once again, a heartfelt thank you to each and every one who prayed for us, and supplied missions' resources for this wonderful trip into an amazing part of God's vineyard.

And one final blow-out! The rains finally came on the day we drove back to Harare, and after coming across a semi that had jack-knifed on the highway, we saw two of the largest male kudu deer Loxley and Brian had ever seen - right on the highway! We told Ben Someone was sending him off from Africa with a double-portion blessing (proof attached)!

2006 Africa Reports

These reports start life as emailed updates sent home while we are in transit. They are later reworded somewhat before being published on the Internet - to carefully respect the cultural and political sensitivities of the region... To save download time, many of the images here are hyperlinked to a larger more detailed one if you want to have a closer look. They aren't just a log of activity, but we try to offer insight into what we experience, and how it affects you.

We are only three days into our visit and it seems like ages longer. We had a full row of seats each on both sectors from Sydney-Perth-Joburg (on relatively full flights too). And spent two hours in Perth with Derick Dove, just two weeks before he and Collette move back to Sth Africa after 25 years in Perth to obey a fresh commission from God (I told him they would be the only people on that Jumbo going back one-way! Everyone else is getting out!). We found a very reasonably priced overnight BnB only 3km from the airport, that provided a free transfer, breakfast, and bed for $A29pp!

Our first “welcome to ministry in Africa problem” erupted barely before the plane left Sydney, when I lost my voice! Oh no, God. Not again. I feel like Paul in 2 Corinthians, having pleaded with God so often to take away these inevitable afflictions in my respiratory/vocal system. After enjoying a year of trouble-free health in Sydney, and having taken a stand 47 weeks ago against my increasing asthmatic condition (and thank the Lord, not taking a single shot of anything in all that time), a slight cold has erupted into a headache, heavy congestion, bronchitis again… (but mercifully, no asthma).

Our second “welcome to ministry in Africa problem” jumped up at the flight counter when my ticket “disappeared”, and they would not let me onto the plane. It was weird. John and I scoured our baggage, wallets several times; the airlines official had gotten John and I mixed up on the tickets, then said he had given us the ticket back, but we could not find it. BA wanted to charge me for a full flight to Harare then Sydney! A fortune. They had my identity, the seat was booked, but would not budge. One staff member said, “do it E-ticket next time”. Big help that was. With time running out, I had to purchase a ticket Jbg-Hre-Jbg for an additional $A500. I was really mad at this fiasco, but my spirit was saying, “recognise where the harassment is coming from”, which enabled me to calm down. We made it onto the plane with 5 minutes to spare. And the crazy, crazy part was once in the air, we went again over our travel documents, and there was the missing ticket in John’s wallet! How it got there, and/or how we missed seeing it – we have no idea….

We arrived in Harare Saturday afternoon and hit the ground running! Arranged the travel, etc, with Loxley. He and Mavis had only arrived back from their delayed-by-illness trip to UK the day before, so it was pretty rushed for everyone. But, it was good to see them, and they were very helpful in setting us up to leave the next morning for Bulawayo. And Kefasi Makava walked over to see us; it was so good to see my son-in-the-faith again. The process is not yet finished with the Australian Embassy for his visa, but it’s not far away. We hope to bring him home with us on August 11. He stayed for dinner, and is so looking forward to coming to live with us in Sydney. The culture shock will still be considerable, but at least he will know quite a few who have been here from our church.

The drive down to Matabeleland was uneventful. There is much more fuel around and that’s a relief, after the tension of last year.

ODD SPOT #1 – How different is the moral climate from Australia’s, I hear you ask? Try this on for size! We carefully and prayerfully pick up hitchhikers from time to time. This trip was on Sunday, so Bible carriers were plentiful on the highway. At one spot in the bush, a mother and 11 y/o girl were trying to get a lift. We stopped, opened the door, and the mother put the girl in, told us where she was going, AND CLOSED THE DOOR!! So, two old varungu (white men) drove this young lass some 40k to the town. I said to John, “would you ever see such a thing happen in Australia!?!?” Yes, folks, it’s not all bad in Zimbabwe – there is such a greater wholesome trust here – no public displays or sale of pornography, and young girls are relatively safe.

In Bulawayo, it was such a joy to drive over to where Garry McMahon and the team of 7 from Blue Mountains Church of Christ were staying, after two weeks of the most challenging ministry in the displaced persons’ camps outside Bulawayo. They have had such a learning and giving experience (Elizabeth and I had spent a couple of sessions with them during their months of preparation). And on Monday, they are heading off with our friend, Sam Gabara, into the National Park bush and Victoria Falls for four days.

The seminar here in Plumtree went well the first day. There are quite a lot more leaders attending (total count passed 50), and Cosmos has a couple of ministers coming all the way from Beitbridge (450k away), and hopes we can do a similar seminar there next year. My voice had returned barely enough to get through the sessions, but the interpreters did a good job in helping me.

Hie everyone from Nyamandlovu, 20k’s out of Bulawayo, Zimbabwe. Nyama = flesh; ndlovu = elephant! And that’s what John and I will end up looking like with the kindness of our present host, Mick Allard. Mick is a well-known painter who has accommodated me for the past four trips to this part of Zimbabwe – a haven in every way (his paintings have always created a lot of interest among our friends, and he now has a website www.michaeljallard.com ). His 9 y/o son, Jack, was delighted to discover John will play cricket and chess with him!

The five days at Plumtree wound up Friday late afternoon and my voice somehow survived (some days from 9am till 9pm…). The coughing, and interrupted sleep pattern continued all week and by Friday I was wrecked. But, somehow, prayer from John and the unseen host of pray-ers back home kept me going, and according to all reports it was a very effective conference. A lot of ladies attended this one, and as time went along, they pitched into the discussions more and more – quite un-African…

ODD SPOT #2 – The sergeant chaplain of the Army base again attended most of the sessions, and invited us one night to visit a woman in a Zimbabwean cult he had been witnessing to. It turned out to be a guru-type Hindu-style god-man cult, and she was helping lead their local branch. Initially, she was not willing for us to pray for her, as she said she was unsure who Jesus really is. However, the Holy Spirit showed me some details on certain health conditions she had as a result of her contact with the spirit world through dabbling in this cult. This seemed to shock her – that her constant pain and crippled feet (hidden under a blanket) were the result of the witchcraft “law of compensation”. Her attitude changed quite dramatically, and she asked heartily for us to pray then and there. We left her considerably more open for the chaplain to return and continue to read what the Bible has to say about the person of Jesus Christ.

Saturday morning saw us in another leadership seminar with the growing church leadership of George Moyo’s church, Breakthrough Ministries. Compared to most of the churches I have visited, this one is a very mature group, and always a joy to be around! After a two-hour opening prayer meeting(!!), they had a praise service for 90 minutes (full bore!), then we had another hour of preaching. This made for a day of around 61/2 hours of meeting, plus another hour of fellowship! But, they mainly meet once a week, and make the most of their time together. The idea of clock-watching so they can run off to other commitments seems to be far from their mindset. A former Lifeline student (Chamu) led the singing again – enough to send your spirits soaring right into heavenly places! Then another ex-student, Dorcas, asked when Debbie was coming back to see them! Heck, it’s been 5 years since Debbie stayed in Bulawayo and taught part of the Lifeline Ministry Training Program! But, several remember her with great affection (was it the lollies, Deb?)!

Sunday 16/7 - we went out to an outer suburb to a small church that meets in a high school – together with 31 other churches!!! It was like a Paddy’s Market smorgasbord of churches of every conceivable variety!! I wandered around filming a few, as the singing styles clashed with each other – classroom to classroom. It blew us away! The school charges a very cheap rental for a room, and they queue up to take them! And of course, being African, their names are usually a mouthful – often including words like “global, worldwide, universal, national”, etc, etc.

Then we drove out to where Shepherd and Alice Mutasa have started a small butchery business. He was in a 3-rollover smash two days ago (no seatbelt on – this is Zimbabwe, remember), and we were amazed at his recovery – not even neck soreness). Alice was a 2001 student too (a good year, Debbie!) and has had to shut down her clothing business because of the recession. We also met Sitabile (widow of Felix Mhlanga (Lifeline teacher and brother who died after a long battle with stomach cancer in January). They had a child just before he died, and my heart went out to her. Praise God, we were able to pass on some of the unallocated missions’ money from our church that we have been carrying with us.

So, we now have a three-day break from the intensity of last week and the coming fortnight up north in Gweru. So, yesterday (Monday), John and I drove to nearby Matopos National Park, home to 40 rhino (you are warned, get out of your car and we will shoot to kill – literally - because of poachers of rhino horn), and several wildlife species (giraffe, deer, crocs, hippo, etc). It was John’s first time in the bush, and we had a marvellous day – finishing at Cecil Rhodes grave at “World’s End” – made famous at the end of “the God’s Must be Crazy” where he threw the coke bottle off the end of the world! We visited several caves, dams, and saw some amazing granite formations (mother and child enclosed).

Unannounced power cuts are daily here now, and water is switched off daily for a few hours. If you can afford one, you buy a generator. Fuel is now $Z480,000 (that’s about $US1 on the parallel market rate, and is now much more available (you have to search, but last year, I had to drive into Botswana to get diesel to drive back to Harare!).

Thanks to everyone who has continued to pray for us. My voice and heavy chest cold are slowly recovering – in time for the next nine-day, all-day teaching stint in Mkoba. We’ll try to send some more from Gweru – providing the Internet café isn’t down again.

We arrived back in the capital Sunday night straight from Gweru where we completed eight full days straight of teaching, preaching, praying with people, and generally getting exhausted! An “African moment” happened yet again when on the way through Harare to the Lifeline Base, I took John through downtown Harare (pop 2 million) after telling him I needed to make contact with Kefasi Makava to pass on the developments re his coming back with us to start a two-year stint in Sydney with our church. When who should step off the very crowded footpath but Kefasi! He will now fly home with us.

We have had a lot of impromptu ministry, running into people left, right, and centre along the way. We were well received by Joy’s friends, Roy and Melodie Wilson. Roy is currently the Presbyterian minister in Gweru, and their manse / house was like a haven to us (our accommodation in Mkoba stalled when Addmore could not get access to the home our church helped purchase until the day after we left).

Mkoba was a terrific time. We were the only varungu (white people) in 30,000 – which makes it very safe; people know you are Christian helpers, and honour that (unlike Australia). The pastor (Addmore) left his bike unlocked out the front for five days during the teaching times. When asked why he didn’t lock it, he replied, “oh I do if I ride into Gweru, but this is Mkoba”. We were trying to reconcile that with the Western Suburbs of Sydney…. The church attendance rate is now, with the economic hard times, around 70%! I have never heard of such a figure anywhere else in the world! As we said last update, there are meetings EVERYWHERE and at ALL TIMES! It’s unbelievable – listening to the beautiful singing that wafts across the township (Mkoba Villages 1 to 20! How’s that for Rhodesian originality?).

Much walking is done here; every morning we walk and pray up in the National Botanical gardens. Last night, I jogged 7k around the block, past the President’s palace. Just before I came to the 6pm road closure (barriers, armed soldiers, spikes across the highway), a screaming siren on a motor bike at 90kph warned all pedestrians, cars (and lone jogger!) that the Presidential entourage was coming out of the Palace heading back to his private residence out north. EVERYTHING stopped dead. Including me. As the several vehicles and 40+ heavily armed soldiers raced past, I asked another pedestrian, “what is this?”, he replied, “It is our President, and if you move they will shoot you”. And he wasn’t kidding…. I didn’t move…. Come on, fellow joggers… When was the last time you ran past Kirribilli with the back of your hair on end???

Stop Press: The currency was devalued by 1000% yesterday. Three zeros were cut off, and new notes came in today – the largest being $Z100m ($A300!). This is much better for handling (we needed a backpack in the South). Up till yesterday the largest one was $Z100,000 ($A30c!) – but no news on the underlying inflation rate (reported at 1400% - that’s 1% every 6 hours).

We are off to Mozambique in the morning after yet another “African” stuff-up in the visa process… It never ends. This time, the Mozambican office would not accept Zim$ for us three foreigners (John and I are being joined by Andrew from Andrew Evans church in Chesterfield UK). But they didn’t tell Loxley. The passports just sat there for three weeks; then the clerk was about to go to the bush for a funeral (common here). Mavis rescued the passports with less than a day to go, but we all now have to pay $US25 (instead of $US10) for a “late application”! Oh what a frustrating place to live and minister – you need patience, grace, and to watch “Zorba”!

We are looking forward to seeing Sparrows' Nest again, and the people at the Base in Beira. We plan to connect with many of the pastors again who have attended our Lifeline ministry and leadership development courses over past years. Jeff Wakeman has added youth leader training too with his local contacts. We are looking forward to the visit (but not to the slow 600k trip in one day).

ODD SPOT #3: There has been a report of a man arrested in one of the larger supermarkets. In the current economic situation, security has been tightened to prevent an increase in shoplifting. He had tried to carry a suitcase in. When stopped by the security guard, he challenged the man’s attempt to take his suitcase off him and store it until he left the shop. He was told, “I am sorry, Sir, but you cannot take a suitcase into the store.” “Suitcase!”, he indignantly replied, “THAT’S MY WALLET!!”

Thanks once again for all the prayers on our behalf. They have made a significant difference in my health (which was teetering on the edge of the cliff for three weeks). And to top it off, I have been able to check the Aussie Rules a couple of times, and find that despite the conspiracy of umpires to cast us out of the finals, we have been triumphing!

The past week was spent in a pretty hectic fashion going 600km down the highway and border to Beira, Mozambique. John, Loxley, and I were joined by Andrew from the Lifeline-supporting church in Chesterfield, UK. The roadblocks were incessant as the money changeover took place and the various "official" arms of enforcement went searching for local currency on the move. When your cash is depreciating 4% per day, we can't understand why anyone would keep large amounts stashed anyway.

But, Beira was such a blessed time of ministry - numbers we have never seen before (Brian's 8th visit). We taught a total of 85 pastors and youth leaders all day, Saturday, with a further 35 attending Friday and/or Monday the other pastoral development teaching times. A great hunger for God and His Word - to not only grow, but also strengthen the local churches according to the Word. One youth pastor was a landmine amputee with no legs whatsoever. His friends brought him in perched on the pannier of a pushbike - reminding us of the men who tore the roof off the house in Jesus' time!

What a blessed time John and I have had in Africa. We took it home in our hearts and spirits. You can't come here and stay the same...

2005 Africa Reports

May 30 The journey out...

Jeremy and I left Sydney for the 31-hour trip to Harare via Singapore and Joburg... The spotless efficiency of Singapore airport (World's no. 1 airport for 13 years), complete with free internet in the enormous transit area, plus (to Jeremy's delight!) $2.70 laksas gave way to.... welcome to Africa! We queued twice in the first half hour at Joburg airport to (literally) squeeze through a narrow door with hundreds of other transit passengers, to pass through an almost non-existent security check. Then , after settling into a very pleasant place for our 5 hour stopover, had to wait again for the credit card machine ("sorry, Sir, there appears to be no paper"; followed by, "we are having a little technical difficulty with the machine"). No problems... A good intro for Jeremy to what awaits him, after the smooth efficiency of Singapore Airlines and airport!

We had no sooner written that bit and discovered that our e-tickets required a boarding pass validation before they would let us on the plane to Harare from Joburg - and even though the gate was still open, the 'recording' had ceased 10 minutes previously! So, we were stuck for an extra 5 hours - making the trip over 39 hours go to whoa... Longest ever for me. Funnily enough, though, with room Singapore-Joburg to stretch out on rows of seats, we did not suffer any jetlag.

June 12 Update #1 – from Harare

Jeremy and I have been here in Africa for nearly two weeks, returning from a quite exhausting trip to Central Mozambique yesterday. We covered a lot of ground, visiting the Sparrows’ Nest orphanage our church has been supporting for the past three years, the Lifeline Base in Beira (supported since 1989), and three very l o n g days up higher in Manica province – staying in a real African village with 49 church leaders coming in for teaching and training. We had to sleep in a mud-brick hut – on the hard floor with no mattress! I (Brian) am just too old and creaky for this kind of “realism”… Our backs hurt; no electricity, no seats to sit on, smoke from innumerable fires in your nostrils continually, long drop long-grass toilet, reed outhouse for washing (see the 6am with Jeremy’s hand raised in the photo, next to the cattle corral!), fish and rice for three days! But what a great time with sincere, loving people who were so appreciative of us coming. One man asked us how many hours drive Australia was away from where we were (in Beira)!

Vanduzi was quintessential Africa! Smoke from early morning cooking fires. We just had to enclose this photo... These people, in their poverty, were so kind and generous to us...

Things are very “tender” where we currently are, as the Police have forcibly moved on some 30,000 people from roadside trading and “temporary” housing areas around the cities. Oh, the hurt… Harare is much cleaner as there are no street traders anywhere. No one hassles you on the street – very different from recent previous trips. Where they have gone…?? There is such need here. We walked down into the inner city to visit a friend of Brian's, and we were literally the only two varungu (Europeans) we saw anywhere! Caucasian people seem to have abandoned the downtown city.

We are pretty tired at present. But, yeah, we have managed to squeeze in a little jogging here and there (running past the President’s palace and the heavily armed palace guard was a new experience for Jeremy!). And Jeremy has been teaching children Aussie Rules kicking and marking wherever he goes. It’s like watching the Pied Piper!

ODD SPOTS

June 17 Update #2 - from Harare again

We have just returned to the Lifeline Base after going out for a meal with the Directors, Loxley and Mavis Ford. The bill came to $Z1 million! But, we must add that was for the four of us. Oh – by the way – before you think we are living the high life here - it came to the equivalent of $A15 per head all up!!

Tomorrow we head for three days at Lake Kariba with the Fords – first time for both of Jeremy and myself. There are reports of elephants and lots of crocs near the lake-edge lodge we are staying at. Noah’s words to Jeremy yesterday on the phone were, “don’t be scared of the animals, Daddy!”

We have just spent two days in Chitungwiza, the nearest thing in Zimbabwe to Soweto in South Africa. An estimated 1m black Zimbabweans (and one white resident!) live 20 km out of Harare in very high density. We saw the devastation the Govt policy of bulldozing the camps has done, and our hearts ached when we saw women and children camping out in the open (it gets cold at night here this time of year). The locals are calling it the Tsunami, and it looks like a smaller version of the photos of Aceh.

Pastors and leaders came together from quite a number of churches and we had a great time over two full days teaching and fielding questions. We were told not many varungu (white men) go out there, but we sure benefited from the experience. The photo is of the last session (under a fruit tree!). I (Brian) am going back after Jeremy returns home.

We are looking forward to ministering in the Chinhoyi churches for 5 days on the way back from Kariba. Our stay will overlap old friends Jim and Jackie Bowler (from Manchester, UK) for 2 days, and that is a bonus! We will be staying in the same house as they are.

Update #3 from Bulawayo

I feel like old Paul writing this one... Jeremy has gone home; I turn 60 on my own in 5 days time; and travelling and ministering on your own is no great joy… Fortunately, before this sounds too much like a hippo wallowing in its own mud, I am staying with Mick again 18k outside town. Mick’s painting furiously again for an exhibition in Florida next December. He is currently struggling to capture the essence of his neighbour’s scrawny old sulphur crested cockatoo! His paintings never cease to amaze me! Especially his bike series. The original photo of this one is quite amazing! There really were seven people on one bike!

Lake Kariba was great, but now a ghost town with no tourists. Jeremy caught his tiger fish, and came face-to-face with a few agitated elephants for the first time! We did one day in the Matusadonha National Park – lots of animals and birds as we drove and cruised in a boat along the Lake’s edge (felt safer…)!

Jeremy and I were spoiled by our 5 days around Chinhoyi. It was perpetual ministry, but (as someone prophesied to us beforehand), it was very different to what we were expecting; it was almost entirely personal one-on-one with many, many people. But different from home. For instance, we visited a farmer under harassment, who suspected his commercial export roses operation had been cursed by re-settlers using a witch-doctor. Continual disease was ruining his whole stock. We used the authority of Jesus’ name and broke the uroyi (curse); he came back 3 days later very excited to say there was absolutely no sign of disease in a sudden burst of new growth! That’s the kind of reality you live and minister in here. If you don’t handle that stuff to well, it’s best to stay home in Oz... And we cheered up a lot of people in a very distressing time. The church caretaker just had his dwelling knocked down. Our friends, the Banda family, are about to move for the umpteenth time. Jeremy spent a lot of time discussing with Peter how to put into operation an effective discipleship process for new Christians.

I (Brian) preached in the Banket church last Sunday (where Martha Zulu and her family still fellowship after Peter's death), <<< The church office behind their house was - ahem - renovated last week... Meanwhile, Jeremy played in the band for the meeting in Chinhoyi at which Jim and Jackie Bowler ministered. They are familiar to many of us after their visit from The UK to our church last year (elders Peter Banda and Shadreck Beka with Brian and Jim Bowler >>>).

Jeremy’s big hit for his trip was playing bass in a band at our Chinhoyi host’s 50th birthday party! It was a great night and they loved his joyful invasion! Speaking of invasion, we have mentioned Peter Zulu on former visits. He died last year, and when we visited his widow and children at their home, we found the Tsunami had gone through their township. Their tuckshop (no permit) was demolished out front, and Peter’s church office (a well-built addition out back) was also smashed to bits. The whole township was in a similar state.

I addressed the Christian Students Union at the Harare Secondary Teachers’ College the night after Jeremy left. My topic was identifying mweya wetsvinamato (religious spirits) and how to deal with them and their influence. As usual, when you address this subject, an unprecedented (according to the chairman) level of restlessness, disturbances, people falling asleep, distractions, and so on, occurred. People in Zimbabwe are much more aware of this realm than Aussies, but it still gets the invisible realm fired up!

Last night, I visited a elderly farmer and his wife who have helped us on previous visits. Their house was built many years ago by one Miss Guiness of the Guiness Brewers family in Ireland. Their workers have often seen “her spirit riding her horse” near her grave. We discussed some of the manifestations that have occurred around their home. This is commonplace here, and you pray for people and to our Lord Jesus for His protection continually.

Staying at Mick's again outside Bulawayo brought me in touch yet again with this man's amazing gift for capturing Africa! His bicycle paintings are just something to be seen. I would love to put them all on the web! This painting was done off a photo with seven people on one bike!

I am in two different churches this weekend; then 3 days near the Botswana border for a 3-day live-in pastors’ conference (this means I can cross over and fill up with diesel – chronically short nationwide at present). Then back to Bulawayo for 3 days, back to Gweru for 6 days with Mkoba township pastors for a conference. Being probably the only murungu (white person) again in a township of 20,000 is really an experience! It’s very safe and friendly, although you have to lock everything and keep your wits about you at all times!

Later update: We have had a wonderful time in Plumtree, near the Botswana border, with the local Ministers' Fellowship - doing a three-day seminar on Corinthians 11-14 - "how much can we apply today to our local churches?" Some of the ladies with church responsibilities have attended too, including one albino sister >>>.

Email has driven us nuts this trip. It has not improved over recent years. Turning 60 alone was not looking like much joy, but the local people surprised me with TWO birthday celebrations! Cake(s), and of course it IS Africa after all!! Plenty of singing and a bit of dancing…. I was really touched by their affection. I wish I could bundle them all up and bring them home to Sydney... In the midst of real serious economic hardship, they are so cheerful and full of faith in God’s goodness.

After doing another leadership seminar at George Moyo's church in Bulawayo, it was off early Sunday morning to pick up Artwell from TCZ (Theological College of Zimbabwe), and the 170km drive back to Mkoba for the 10am service. Except it was raining! Most unusual; here this time of year, and we nearly skidded off the highway at one bridge on the slick road surface. Another 4WD had flipped over ona railway bridge and destroyed itself just before us...

2004 Africa Reports

2/5/04 Update #1 – trouble from before we left!

Hie (Zimbabwean greeting), everybody. We are back in the land that DeFaT have warned all sane Aussies from visiting, to find that things have settled down here somewhat since I (Brian) was here last December. Our getting here was “bumpy” to say the least, so we have sent this out to friends, family, and some other interested folks from Harare before we leave tomorrow morning for Gweru where we start the first of two Ministry Training Programs. 24 hours before getting on the plane, I was still in bed in the coronary ward of the Intensive Care Unit at Gosford Hospital…. Here’s the story so far….

The departure…

Last weekend our church had our annual camp at the foot of the Blue Mountains with Jim and Jackie Bowler, Lifeline friends from Manchester, UK. Unfortunately, my enjoyment of it was limited to the spiritual and fellowship aspects, as physically, I was not in good shape. The beginnings of a severe bronchial asthma attack were brewing and I suffered badly both nights up there. We were up at our family’s holiday cottage at Budgewoi where we have taken Jim and Jackie for two days r ‘n’ r after their wonderful ministry to us before they headed home to Manchester (via Perth), when a build up of bronchial asthma hit me like I have never had before in my life (I am not asthmatic by background), and I had to drive to the emergency ward at Wyong Hospital at midnight for help.

They tested me for various things (X-rays, blood tests, ECG, etc). An ECG graph done at 3am registered a heart attack after I was settled in for the night on the leads – plugged up all over! The 6am ECG test clearly showed major aberrations to my heart condition. Even I could see what they were saying. When I told the doctor I was due to fly out to Zimbabwe in 48 hours, he rolled his eyes and said, “I hope your travel insurance is paid up coz you’re not going anywhere…” So, I was off by ambulance to Gosford ICU the next day for more tests by the coronary specialist, and some serious discussion about what was really wrong.

On the funny side – getting bawled out by a grumpy cardiac nurse because I was wandering around (with leads hanging off me like a choko vine) looking for a phone to call Elizabeth and a dunny to visit, shouting “get back in bed! You’ve had a heart attack!” I was the only happy patient in a very depressing ward… Kept doing my stretches though when they weren’t looking…

Finally, the specialist admitted my blood tests showed no signs whatsoever of a heart attack (Including a “silent one” that the Wyong doctor had indicated had happened) – the enzyme count was perfect. So, it looks like the original alarm was from a heart strain because of the lack of oxygen, and coughing like a chronic smoker in the death rattles set it off. But it was a temporary aberration rather than a real attack. They wanted to keep me in for another night for observation, but without my mentioning I planned to be on plane in less than 24 hours time, they agreed to let me go home and call on my own family doctor.

“Strangely”, my own GP was not on deck that evening when we got home and I had to see a new Chinese doctor to fill a prescription to take to Zimbabwe. It turned out that he was a born-again believer who has only been in the area a few weeks. His parting words were, “I will pray for you in Zimbabwe”.

Still, I am going to get a full stress test by my local GP when I get home in early July. Just to check if it “was a warning shot across my bow” as one doctor put it. I do have faith in God’s goodness, but I am also a pragmatist and believe sound information is very important in decision-making.

On the positive side though, I felt to trust the Lord, not fight anything, and make the most of the rest. Turned out I hadn’t realised how tired I was – slept 13 hours straight the night spent in the Cardiac ward. I felt much fresher going to Africa.

It’s good to know God in a time like I have had. [Psa 84:5-7] jumped out and blessed me (thank God for Gideons – I had nothing with me, expecting a quick trip in and out). Blessed are those whose strength is in you, who have set their hearts on pilgrimage. As they pass through the Valley of Baca, they make it a place of springs; the autumn rains also cover it with pools. They go from strength to strength, till each appears before God in Zion. My heart was already on pilgrimage in Zimbabwe and I didn’t intend to leave it in Gosford Hospital!….

Please pray for us as we are in Zimbabwe especially. I am not well yet (breathing problems are not over). Seems like what I call a “typical Zimbabwean attack”…. Mwari akuropa fadzwe! (God bless you, in Shona). At least I did get uninterrupted time in hospital to brush up on some Shona… Regards from Brian

And a little further update from Harare after arriving here….

Yet another quite amazing mini-miracle took place at Sydney Airport. In fact, it was quite weird… We were in the long queue for several Qantas flights, when all of a sudden an official came up to us (and only us) and said, “go over there to the other row of check-ins”. It was the USA row opposite and with few queued up. When we approached the counter with our four enormous overweight suitcases (mostly full of stuff for the Relief ministry), the check-in operator said, “you shouldn’t be here; you should be over there with all those people”… I explained we were doing what we were told and she booked all the luggage through without raising an eyebrow (the significance of the USA counter is you get 64kgs each if you fly through the USA on your global fare – coz Americans don’t know how to travel light!). It was again (seriously) like an angel leading our steps (in fact, I went and read Acts again as a result of this!).

We had a flight jam-packed in cattle class. Talk about no room at the inn… Got to the overnight stop with few glitches, although Joburg airport swarms with touts, thieves, and beggars. Then, on to Harare airport where the church letter we had composed to accompany everything saved us from duty and inspection. Mind you, it took three customs officials discussing it (beginning with one who kept asking about what everything we were bringing in was worth). Prayer from home and on the spot made the difference. We have heard some horror stories of demands for duty on all kinds of stuff being brought in.

So, we are now settled into another three weeks of travel, teaching, catching up with people, trying to be relevant in a country where the needs are overpowering. Our trip to Gweru was "interesting" in an African sort of way... We towed an old bomb car for 300km unregistered, etc, etc. The man involved was a Lifeline student and commented later to us the township was not used to seeing varungu (white men) help a local (black) man push a car! Similarly, Loxley takes his tool kit everywhere (and Brian his book and shoe healing ministry) and this speaks volumes about having a mushandi (servant) spirit.

Update #2 from Gweru

We are in a “breakfast” break here in Gweru at 11am! The sun is shining – it’s been windy and cold in Gweru – but today is a lovely day. We are in the third day of 8am to 4.30pm sessions. Because the location is so much better than when Craig and Michelle were here, the students can get here and go home much more easily. We have accommodation on site, even our own bathroom – in the Lutheran ministry complex – it is very clean, basic but functional, and used for all kinds of training – computers, home economics etc, for young women, as well as some small conferences taking place. The management have been very kind to us and the food has been excellent! It is so good having accommodation on site where we can go and retire to bed early and sleep well. You operate here by the sun hours rather than our kind of timeframe.

Since driving down the 300k from Harare, we have been in good health, thank the Lord. It has been one week since we left Sydney, and Brian's health has continued to improve daily. There have been absolutely no signs of any heart issues, and his breathing is getting stronger. The strain of 6 hours a day speaking, and some local church ministry has showed a little bit, but nothing common sense (as in, Elizabeth’s warnings) can’t control!

The course is going really, really well. Such a hungry group of pastors and developing leaders – from 8 different churches. Brian used his Gen 37 lollies for 11 sons and chocolate for Joseph illustration today to great effect while teaching on God’s grace. Africans love straight-forward humour and get the message clearly. And yeah! Brian "donated" many of his old ties to the students. They loved them! And were believing they would pick up the "Brian anointing" as one said!!! But why they insist on dressing like Europeans is beyond us….

15/5 Update #3 after Bulawayo

This update comes from ‘Youngways Guest House’, Bulawayo where Brian and I have been staying since we drove here last Saturday from Gweru. Loxley has remained in Gweru, without a vehicle, to continue teaching the group there. Brian and I are very grateful for this accommodation. It’s a rambling old house, run as a base for people involved in Christian ministry; it’s in need of major repairs, but clean, inexpensive, and we have the use of a large kitchen with all the basic necessities. Our hosts are a retired American couple who are most gracious and helpful. Brian even found a guava tree laden with fruit which he cooked up and chilled so we can add it to our dessert and porridge…

Now that I’ve worked out that $Z500=12c, $Z4000=$A1, $Z10,000=$A2.50 etc, I’ve been able to not only buy our own food, but supplies for the students here, from money given by some of our church folks for this specific purpose. They are always short of food.

The Lifeline teaching programme here has drawn students from as far away as Hwange (350kms), mostly in their early twenties and as many women as men. This group has some catching-up to do so classes begin at 9 and finish at 9 (with breaks, of course). They are very long days, but Brian's voice is holding up, and his health is improving every day. Credit for this goes to our Great Physician and your prayerful support. This class is being held in a nearby church facility, and the students have accommodation and cooking facilities next door in a hospice. We need you to pray for their accommodation in the next programme as the hospice facilities will not be available.

Yesterday, we caught up with Wadzanai (Moses Koroka’s wife) who will graduate as a registered nurse this December. She continues to follow the Lord and it was a real pleasure to see her again. Later, we had dinner with a family at Nyamandlovu who previously gave accommodation to both Loxley and Brian. They are facing a severe personal crisis and it seemed God sent us there ‘for such a time as this’. We were able to share our faith in Christ and pray for them for a way forward (they are not practising believers).

The classes here will conclude Wednesday night and after Brian ferries them into town (no-one has transport) on Thursday, we will return to Gweru (only a couple of hours away) with George and Cosmos for the Lifeline network leaders’ get-together discussing the future direction of Lifeline. Next Monday, on our way back to Harare, Loxley, Brian and I will detour to see Martha Zulu and her family, and pass on the last of the gifts our church collected for Peter Zulu’s family after his death.

There is an amazing amount of Christian activity in this country but as one leader described it, “It is 200 miles wide but only 6 inches deep.” With 3800 being buried each week with AIDS, the message has yet to ‘take hold’. There is a vast gap between the widespread public profession of Christ and the private practice of so many; this goes with a great shallowness of understanding and respect for the Scriptures in many movements here.

Brian has been conducting his alternative “healing ministry” again – fixing broken shoes with our ever-trusty Shoegoo, and binding up the broken hearted – ah – broken books with our specially bought book tape…. They are so appreciative. The condition of some of the footwear would appal you….

We were up at 4am this morning. It's strange how you sleep different patterns from home. We have just completed our Lifeline leadership conference back in Gweru and head out later this morning for Chinhoyi. Politically, things have really quietened down across the country with the population going about their daily life as per usual. Fuel and food are more available (unlike the crisis situation we encountered last year) but inflation at 600% staggers your mind when you try to comprehend the effect on the ordinary people here. It’s awful. Men who work away from home are facing paying 2 to 4 weeks wages just for the bus fare to get home and see their family…. Stack that up alongside the AIDS stats and you get the picture….

17/5 (final) Update #4

We have just arrived back in Harare after 2 weeks away in areas where (apart from one night in Gweru) email access has been really limited. Today we left Gweru at 8am, after finishing our leadership time for Lifeline last night. It was a profitable time and it was clear that the Holy Spirit was guiding us forward, albeit slowly…. So today we drove Peter Banda (the pastor off the farm that Joy and I went to in Dec, with the converts from the re-settlers) back to Chinhoyi (nearly 300km). Peter and his family were driven out of their home and land two weeks after we were with them last December. In Chinhoyi, we met the senior elder of their church network there and spent time with him, then with Peter’s family for an hour. He has a delightful daughter named Faith. She took a shine to Elizabeth 2 years ago and still remembered her (she’s only 6!). She is a remarkably gifted child, and complained to her father lately that her 18 and 15 y/o brothers "don’t give her enough respect!"

Then we drove 25 km to visit the Zulu family in Kuwadzana (Banket, where Debbie Hudson stayed in 2001 and Joy Doughty last year). They were not expecting us, but praise God, the whole family were home and we were able to catch up with all of them in one visit! We had hoped to stay overnight and catch up with their church before catching a local bus the 100km back to Harare, but because all the family were home (some live in Harare) we did not ask. We passed on the rest of the special offering given by members of our church at home to Martha and she was touched. She seemed incredibly serene considering it's only three months since her husband died. This kind of loss is surely THE test of whether we have real faith in the God of the resurrection or not... And the family is shining!

Then we drove the 100k back to Harare, stopping to visit Alan and Dorothy Graham, who are the Directors of a very effective children’s ministry called Child Evangelism Fellowship. They are friends of Fords and we have met before; they are also friends of the Bowlers and oversee a youth bible club program which has over 23,000 young people and children attending in Harare alone! Wow! They hope to come to Aussie some time.

Thank the Lord for so many praying for us. It has been noticeable. In fact, on this trip we have been obviously carried along by God’s protective grace and care in so many ways. Even in what appears trivial… So many things go wrong here. It never stops. Arrangements don’t work out; organisation goes down, and you have to learn to roll with it or you go crazy with exasperation. For instance, in Gweru Brian broke a pane of glass in a door through jamming it. No worries in Australia, but here – this can be major drama – especially when they see you are a white foreigner with foreign exchange! So when we reported it to the management of the Lutheran complex the course has been in, they got back to us with a quote for $Z412,000! That’s $A103! A ridiculous price here. As we were deliberating about what to do, another local pastor walked into our leadership conference who has all kinds of building expertise, and he immediately gave Loxley advice where we could pick up the glass ourselves at the best price and get the glazier to fit it. It was Friday afternoon (many places close Fridays about 3pm for some reason in Gweru) and it was past time. But an hour later, we had the glass and the total price had dropped from $Z412,000 to $Z40,000 ($A10)!!! That's 900% reduction! I said the pastor quite seriously, “you were sent by God!” That's what we mean by mini-miracles here. The timing occurs so often you almost get blasé about it. Life is full of such niggling irritations here and you have to “stay focused”…

Currency exchange, etc, has freed up. You can swap forex at any bank after years of parallel market operations. This means the exchange rates have all dropped as forex is less scarce. And fuel is more available. We rarely queued this trip. And the police have cracked down on carjackings (an imported problem from Sth Africa). This all helps things move forward.

This last update is being typed at Joburg airport during a 4-hour layover before our overnight flight to London. All in all, we will spend a week in the UK in contact with various Lifeliners, beginning by driving the 100k to Margate from Heathrow to spend time with Ron and Dorothy Davies, Founders of the ministry 30 years ago in Southern Africa. Brian has just finished updating the Lifeline website to include Ron and Loxley’s very interesting History of Lifeline Ministries Southern Africa.

Oh yeah, and we did find a couple of decent coffee shops! (and a lot that were still the same….). No bush, no animals this time. We reserve that nowadays for when we take someone for the first time.

On a personal note, as we close this Trip Update, we praise God for the sustained good health we (Brian and Elizabeth) have enjoyed this visit - especially considering the issues Brian faced at the start of the trip (see Update #1). Brian's Shona lessons came on quite a ways too! So, Mwari akuropa fadze (God bless you) as you read this and pray for the ministry and personnel of Lifeline Ministries Southern Africa!

2003 Trip Reports

17/7/03 Update #1 - Michelle reports...

17/7/03 Update #1 - Michelle reports...

We arrived safely in Harare and have a miracle to report! Our and your prayers have been answered for the safe passage of us and the 20 Bibles and all the other resources we brought over to give away. We were able to bring in the Bibles without any excess luggage fees as our (Craig and Michelle) around-the-world tickets allowed us 64 kilos each!

But an even bigger miracle is to be reported. Harare is a lovely new airport with hardly any air traffic. When we arrived we were out on the footpath within 15 minutes of landing. Usually when people arrive most bags are opened and inspected to see if you are bringing in goods to be sold. We have been concerned that the 20 bibles might be charged a large duty on them, even though we put stickers on them marked, "This bible is a gift from Holroyd New Life Church. It is for free distribution to LifeLine students and is not to be sold".

Well when we were standing by the luggage carousel (for all of 3 minutes) an airport worker walked past who looked like he was on his way home (had his jumper over his shoulder). Brian greeted him in Shona and he stopped (he was surprised that Brian knew the language after he saw us come through the foreigners' gate), and would even bother to greet him - perhaps because he was black. He chatted with us for a while and we found out that he was a professing Christian. We shared why we were in Zimbabwe. Once we had our luggage, he took one of the two trolleys and told us to follow him. He walked to the left of the customs section (which is a row of rooms waiting for bags to be searched), and said something in Shona to one of the officials and didn't even stop! We simply walked completely around customs!

He then left the area. We were stunned! It was like having an angel turn up (Heb 13 style!) - especially after the warnings about what might happen with possible duty on all the Bibles, etc Praise God! He had a plan in place for the safe passage of the bibles that we couldn't possibly foresee or plan ourselves!

We are in good health and spirits. We have had almost no jetlag (after no sleep on the 15 hour flight from Sydney to Joburg). Brian and Craig were buzzing when they saw ex-All Blacks' captain, Sean Fitzpatrick waiting near us for his luggage; he was in South Africa for the Tri-Nations Rugby....

20/7/03 Update #2 - from Beira, Mozambique

From Michelle. Today we went to church in Beira - never will I again complain that our meetings are long - this one was 4½ hours!!! The people here are so eager to have God in their lives and they don't care how long it takes. Here if they don't have God they have nothing, unlike us where we have a comfortable home with TV, one or two bathrooms, electricity, running water and all the things we consider essential like microwaves, washing machines and dishwashers. Nor do they have a medical centre any time let alone 24 hours a day.

Coming across the border from Zimbabwe into Mozambique yesterday was the biggest culture shock of my life! I thought Zimbabwe was poor but Mozambique is unbelievable. Thousands and thousands of people live in mud huts with thatch roofs along the 'main' highway for 300 kms and then you reach the city which is just slum after slum. The best area (that we are staying in) is full of ancient apartment blocks. But many still don't have running water or sewerage services. These people are so in need of God.

The hardest part so far was visiting an orphanage. It became an orphanage simply because some children were dumped at the door of a pastor in his late 50's (mostly AIDS orphans). He now cares for 32 children! No Govt. program or assistance... Brian and Elizabeth visited last year and left money for the roof to be finished on a building to house and educate them. Simple concrete with a new asbestos roof. No lights or plumbing. The girls' dorm has just a concrete floor with old broken thin straw mats for sleeping. That's it! We could do so much to help, but at times, it seems overwhelming. I could not handle seeing this orphanage - it is much worse than anything I have ever seen on a World Vision Child Sponsorship TV ad.

24/7/03 A few lines later from Brian

Craig and Michelle are really fitting in exceptionally well and coped with Mozambique very well. Visiting Domingos Caetano and the orphans was too much for her and she left weeping. That is so good to see… Domingos has the roof on and the floor concreted in one room as a girls' dormitory. The scene would soften the hardest heart.

There are 20 Methodists staying at the Base too, from Seattle, building the roof on a church building. The place is overflowing with people, good coffee and all the food you could wish for in the US of A!! We covet their mountains of food as we chomp on our stale bread and jam (with ¼ an omelette) for breakfast… (is this "lust"???). The Base ran out of water yesterday (Tuesday), but after a little chat from Comrade Loxley the Americans were much more conservative today in water use and we coped OK. The water runs in the city after about 5.30pm every night, but not during the day. These folks are very amenable and don't grumble. They asked Loxley to speak for an hour last night about the Base here.. Anacleto now has control of it (being a Mozambique national makes it easier to deal with Govt affairs); he is doing a good job with it, and the photo will surprise you (if you have read previous reports) how much he has done in renovations.

We are in good health although Craig has had one of those "Mozambique" health problems. We rebuked it tonight as he is in constant pain in his foot…. And today as I touched on some elements of spiritual warfare, etc, the birds Anacleto has here now (chooks, roosters, guinea fowl, turkeys) all went ballistic! It was so distracting that we called everyone to prayer - and they shut up immediately! That's not a spin-doctor report either, as you may well know.

We bought 20 NIV Study Bibles with us sponsored by members of our church. They are expensive enough at home, but here they are unattainable with the crisis in foreign exchange shortages. Loxley Ford suggested they would best be passed on the pastors and teachers of churches, rather than the students, as they are chronically short of good quality resource books and bibles. So, we formally gave one to Anacleto Ferrão in Beira, in front of his (growing) congregation (picture right >>).

What a marvellous Body Christ has put together without human help or engineering! We had a great time with over 20 pastors here in a two-day intensive training time for local leaders. It was very animated and quite a few were men I recognised from previous visits. A group of pastors came back for a third morning to talk about current issues affecting them, so we sat out the front of the Base by the seawall (photo). I love this kind of interaction. There's so much more time here to flesh out issues without that rotten Western clock mentality hovering in the background. They refuse to rush off to some other commitment as we do in Oz. Some asked if we will return next year and do some more extensive teaching. We need a good interpreter though, especially when we're teaching and discussing theological issues. Guilherme (who has looked after Lifeline's literature office) is still looking ill; his wife was here with their new baby (she was pregnant when the last one died).

But, the most rewarding moment was earlier this evening when a man called Antonio came to see us at the Base. On Sunday, we prayed for many, many people for sicknesses. This man asked us to pray for his 11 y/o daughter who was seriously ill with cerebral malaria (it kills people here). We did so in faith, and he came today to say she had been miraculously raised up, fully recovered! When he got home, she was out of bed, eating, her strength had returned, the signs of malaria gone! He said in broken English, "I do not want to be like the nine lepers, but like the one who returned to give thanks for the prayers and give glory to God". Loxley and I knelt on our knees with him, hands raised in adoration of a caring Saviour who cares for the helpless and makes them whole…. All I could think of later was how we can see these kind of REAL miracles multiply to see more needs met, and Joy Doughty's words came back to me again, "being truly humble is passing on to God all praise untouched".

[24/7] As a reminder that this is Africa... Tonight as we drove into Harare, we saw a car parked in the dark on our side of the road half across our lane (just missed it); then a cyclist being dragged off the roadway in the dark after he had been knocked off his bike (no idea how badly injured he was), and then 3 youths rob a woman of several things at a Harare corner and run off into an alley... All within 30 minutes of coming into Harare suburbs…

The descent of Zimbabwe into 80% unemployment has meant growing numbers of homeless in the cities and towns. The photo on the left is not a Christmas tree, but a collection of plastic bottles for recycling in a homeless camp near the Lifeline base in Harare. It's worth a click!

And on the right - the Mozambique way of AIDS awareness. You don't need any words to see the universal humour and message… Men! They're the same all round the world!

2/8/03 Update #3 - from Nyamandlovu, Matabeleland

Once you get out of the main cities, email is so slow. Heck! It took me half and hour just to find the Swans had knocked off Fremantle (first things first!) … Since Update #1, we have been in Gweru in the Midlands for a week of the Lifeline Ministry Training Program with a mixture of pastors and developing leaders. What hits you (we are the only varungu (white people) in the township area) is the number of fresh gravesites in the cemetery! Incredible! Figures released last week said average life expectancy for a male Zimbabwean is now 40, and a female - 30!!! Can you believe that??

We taught every day from 9 till 5. We have a marvellous bunch of students here again. Both Josephs and Addmore are back. One pastor left home at 3am to get here, another travelled overnight... The level of uncomplaining hardship amazes Craig and Michelle (and me too even after seeing so much of it).

The banks have run out of cash and this is making it hard for us too, as we have between us a total of about $A10… Every morning the queues are back a 100m+ at the ATM's, and they get $Z5000 each ($A3)! The largest Zimbabwe note is now worth $A30c (after 400% inflation this year!). We are keeping our $US cash until Victoria Falls. The level of kindness we have experienced here repeatedly has amazed me. We are staying in Gweru in a lovely comfortable home while the owners are in Australia doing fund raising for their ministry.

We are 10km out of town and are the only white people in a township of 20,000+! People are very friendly and there is no sense of danger to us. Craig and Michelle love walking around. We go for our prayer walk at 7am before breakfast. It is very high here (about 1700m ASL) and known for its cold mornings, and being very windy too. Gweru has been quite a lovely rural city that has run down badly.

I am finishing this at the end of our third day of ministry here. They are a great bunch and on a dirt floor with all our stuff dust-covered, we are still having a wonderful time. The pastor's daughter (18) was baptised in the Holy Spirit today. She is so keen to learn and grow. - and gifted too! Michelle has taken up where Elizabeth left off last year with Ruth.

The highlight of our time there was praying for a child that has not seen or moved for several months, after a n'anga (witch-doctor) put a curse on her. His eyes were permanently fully closed and he lay in his mother's arms paralysed. We bound the demon. Two nights later the child was in a home group we attended - fully normal and playing! Blind eyes opened through Jesus' name! We saw God do several things in engaging the powers of darkness. This made us very conscious of Jesus' words in Luke 10:17-21 the seventy-two returned with joy and said, "Lord, even the demons submit to us in your name." He replied, "I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. I have given you authority to trample on snakes and scorpions and to overcome all the power of the enemy; nothing will harm you. However, do not rejoice that the spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven." At that time Jesus, full of joy through the Holy Spirit, said, "I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this was your good pleasure.

We travelled to Bulawayo this morning and are settling into the Lifeline Ministry Training Program here for the next week. A Christian farmer built a school/hall/church building here (25 km from town), and Craig and Michelle are staying with him and his dear wife. He is now President of Zimbabwe Gideons and is interested in what Michelle is doing at home in our High Schools. But, Loxley and I had nowhere to stay. Once again, at the 10^th hour, God supplied, and a neighbouring farmer (not a Christian) offered his overflow accommodation to us. And it is only 10 minutes walk from the hall! Thank the Lord! I met a farmer today who had been kicked off his farm and jailed last year. He is still distressed over what happened to his farm and all the workers and families kicked off the property. His family had developed the farm since the 1890's, before the area was populated...

So, folks, we hope this gives a balanced view of life here and the ministry of Lifeline on the ground. Loxley is turning 66, yet he is still happy to sleep in the most basic of quarters, in rough areas that others would maybe fear for their safety. That's what happens when you are doing what God has called you to - He supplies sufficient grace to do it! And be happy!

4/8/03 Michelle reports from Nyamandlovu…

The students here are a very different bunch than the students in Gweru. In Gweru, most were pastors of churches (some small home churches, some larger churches). I had many opportunities to get to know the four women, Molly, Eilet, Felicia and Ruth, quite well. They are each facing unique difficulties and challenges and are each reaching out to God to see Him break through in their circumstances. Take Eilet, for example (shaking Michelle's hand) She is a widow of just a few years who has become a Christian recently. As is the custom here, her dead husband's family wanted one of his brothers to marry her so they would have access to the estate. She refused, so the in laws organised for a n'anga (witch-doctor) to put a curse on her and her family. The result was that her youngest child (around 2 years old) became blind and limp. When we met her last week the child had been like this for some months. We applied the word of God, teaching her the power she has as a child of God to stand against the enemy in the name of Jesus. We then stood with her and prayed with her and for her. Two days later, I spoke at a combined home group and Eilet was there with her little boy - and he was running around playing on the ground with the other children with his eyes open! I can now truly say I have seen the eyes of the blind opened through the power of God! AMEN!!!!!

James 2 v 5 is so real here - Listen, my dear brothers: Has not God chosen those who are poor in the eyes of the world to be rich in faith and to inherit the kingdom he promised those who love him? The people have so little in the eyes of the world but are so rich in God - they have no choice - it is God or nothing I have seen more miracles here in 3 weeks than I have seen in the past three years. And as Debbie reminded me before we came - we are all worshipping the same God in the same Spirit. Let us lift our faith and our dependence on God so that we can all see Him at work amongst us more often and more powerfully. And we have continued to be niggled by small things like bouts of diarrhoea and colds.

Brian adds - This restoring of sight and movement to the blind and unmoving child made us very, very conscious of Jesus' words in Luke 10:17-21. The seventy-two returned with joy and said, "Lord, even the demons submit to us in your name.? He replied, "I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. I have given you authority to trample on snakes and scorpions and to overcome all the power of the enemy; nothing will harm you. However, do not rejoice that the spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven." At that time Jesus, full of joy through the Holy Spirit, said, "I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this was your good pleasure.

We travelled to Bulawayo on Saturday (Aug 2) and are settling into the Lifeline Ministry Training Program here for the next week. Including using the Sydney Swans' team of ordinary players rebuilding as an example of body ministry! A Christian farmer built a school/hall/church building here (25 km from town). Elizabeth and I stayed there last year, and Craig and Michelle are staying with him and his dear wife. He is now President of Zimbabwe Gideons and is interested in what Michelle is doing at home in our High Schools. But, Loxley and I had nowhere to stay. Once again, at the 10^th hour, God supplied, and a neighbouring farmer offered his overflow accommodation to us. And it is only 10 minutes walk from the hall! Thank the Lord! I met a farmer today who had been kicked off his farm and jailed last year. He is still distressed over what happened to his farm and all the workers and families kicked off the property.

We hope this gives a balanced view of life here. We do lots of walking (some by choice, other times by necessity!). Michelle has already mentioned the constant health attacks we have had on us all along the way. I (Brian) have been hit hard by a virus, and a dry throat (the humidity is extremely low here). This has not made the teaching schedule here easy, with some 5 to 6 hours of public speaking every day.

13/8/03 Update #4 - from Victoria Falls

We are on the outward trail now, after four weeks in the Lifeline activities. So this update isn't very religious! Since the last update, we finished the Training Program at Nyamandlovu (an interesting name... Ndlovu is Ndebele for elephant (it's also a common totemic surname), and Nyama means flesh). It turns out that the farmer Brian stayed with is a gifted professional painter and the house was full of wonderful originals (examples enclosed)! The LH one is called "a shadow of his former self" and is a brilliant comment on the devastation that AIDS is having right where the farm is - farm workers are dying continually right here. In fact, the farmer is planning to consecrate a cemetery on an unused area to reduce the cost of burials for the families. He has also painted a well-known bicycle series. Sadly, the subject is also now dying of AIDS. Click on it to admire the immense detail Mick has put in it...

Again, we mixed, ate, and mingled with the 16 live-in students for the week, and taught on Christ's example of servant ministry and leadership, the elimination of discrimination in the emerging church, and the associated recognition of the work of the Holy Spirit in each believer's ministry. We saw five students baptised in the Holy Spirit on Thursday night

I (Brian) had been driven out to a repossessed farm one afternoon about 25 km away. 159 groups of re-settlers have moved in, with little water, and introduced foot and mouth to the pedigree Herefords which are now quarantined and unsaleable. I briefly met with the farm workers and their church elders, who asked for any Christian literature in Ndebele. I was able to contact Loxley soon after and the Lifeline office will be sending them the Building Your Life series. But, they are last to get priority in mealie sales - they are not re-settlers. Most people in the south (Matabeleland) are down to one meal a day because of this "distribution differential".

Eight of us then had a brai (bbq) in a dry riverbed under a full moon (one small adder snake removed first). Beautiful sight, only marred slightly on the way out by tales of leopards and two re-settlers being killed last year by an angry elephant. I copped a tic bite on the face somehow, but it healed within a few days.

Into Bulawayo on Friday for four days in which we attended George Moyo's church yet again, where a wonderful wedding service / celebration took place. What a joyful time we had! And then caught up with Wadzanai (whom our church helped in her marriage last year to Moses - we supplied the lobola for several mombees/cattle). He has gone to Ireland for work, and she has continued in her nursing training, topping the class in most subjects. The other photo is of two former Lifeline students, twins - Ndumiso (displaying recent wedding ring) and Sindiso. Both are pastors with Breakthrough churches.

Sunday, Cosmos Sibanda picked us up and we ministered at his church in the outer suburbs. We prayed for many people after teaching on the availability of Christ's provision, when we approach God in His prescribed way - through Christ's atonement. There were many sick, and some demonically oppressed, not to mention the unending material hardship pressures they face here. It makes you take the gospel literally!

Craig and I even attempted a jogging tour of Bulawayo's old elite area! Gasping in the dry warm air 4000 feet ASL. After a rest day, Cosmos picked us up from Zak's Place ("executive suites" at $A27 BnB for 3…). The place kinda works... Nothing works properly here, but it was comfortable…

We drove the 440km to Victoria Falls via Hwange. There's a chronic shortage of diesel, so we bought some around the back of a service station in cans. Afterwards, we found out the semi-trailer drivers steal it from their trucks, sell it to the moonlighters for $Z1000/litre, who resell it for $Z1500 ($A95c!). And it was dirty. Cosmos had to get the filters cleaned when we got to the Falls. We met the senior minister of the Hwange churches who had sent five students over 300km to the Course throughout 2003 (5 x 2 week sessions). He commented they had returned with a different spirit of cooperation and teachability that he had not seen in previous efforts to get them trained elsewhere. Two were filled with the Holy Spirit and he had noticed the change immediately on their return last week!

When we arrived at Vic Falls, I went to see Sam (Reedbuck Safaris, whom we used two years ago), and he was able to get us a very amenable 2 bedroom unit right downtown for only $Z40,000 per night (that's $A6 p/p!). So, we three wandered past the curse of Victoria Falls, the incessant young male (illegal) money changers, curio sellers, procurers, etc, and had afternoon tea at the Victoria Falls Hotel (of course!). Pot of proper perc. coffee for $A60c! At one of the premier world hotels, on one of the most spectacular terraces anywhere - overlooking the Falls gorge.... Afterwards, we walked out the front gate at dusk and Craig and Michelle saw some wildlife firsthand for the first time. Within 200m of the electrified perimeter fence, we saw fresh elephant poo, warthogs, baboons, deer, and then... I spotted a very large nyati (buffalo) grazing 100m ahead, right next to the path we were on! OK, folks, time for an orderly quick retreat! Through the gate just as the armed ranger (named Respect...) prepared to lock it for the night!

Today, Craig and Michelle have gone walking to the Falls and bridge. At $US20 each, we (Brian and Cosmos) stayed at the unit. They are doing the 2hr sunset cruise on the Zambesi today too. And then tomorrow we set out for two days overnight at Sinamatella (in Hwange National Park), where the current reports are of lots of shumba (lions)! And the next day, a full day into Chobe in Botswana. Then, it's home for Brian, and the UK for Craig and Michelle, where they meet up with Anna Jarvis's family.

So, this is the holiday end of our missions' tour. You can't come here for the first time without pausing to take in the spectacular nature of the Falls (widest in the world, at 1700m x 100m drop), and the wildlife. We have seen some amazing sights and experiences in God's Garden of Eden here... Click on the photo to see the large old male lions who turned up at dusk to look over the Mazuma waterhole for supper... We saw another seven the next day in a pride (while we were on foot!). Awesome, awesome...

A day trip across the border to Botswana and Chobe River NP was also a highlight. Elephants doing their mud bath thing so close to our boat we could almost touch them... (and not even Michelle was scared by then... - after being chased for 200m at 40k/hr by a very, very angry mother elephant at Hwange, it was all small change!).

To finish with...

We hope you have caught a glimpse through these updates of the very, very different lifestyle here, not through a tourist's eyes, but from people who are learning to "weep with those who weep", and "rejoice with those who rejoice".

It's been such a blessing to have Craig and Michelle here. They have faithfully prayed with and for me every day. We have all battled niggling sicknesses for the whole time here. And they have adapted very well to the continually changing (and often shambolic!) conditions, and mixed so well in the personal one-on-one that counts for so much as we meet, mix, and live among the local believers.

You feel so small here when you see the unending need, not just materially, but spiritually too. The story that helps though is one we heard of a man walking along the seashore, where a school of fish had beached themselves. He saw another man in front of him walking along and randomly picking up a fish here and there and throwing it back into the deeper water. He said to him, "why bother when there are so many dying?" To which the man replied, "it might not make a difference to them, but it sure made a difference to that one!" We have tried to be faithful and sincere in how we have modelled the Christian behaviour Jesus expects of us, both in word, conduct, and helpful actions. And we hope that, along the way, we have made a difference to "that one" and a few more.

Second Trip - Nov 2003

I (Brian) took a brief 12-day trip back to Zimbabwe in November for a Lifeline Network Leaders live-in 3-day conference. Seven of us met to discuss the direction of the ministry, and came away with much to do. Joy Doughty also came from our church here, not to attend the conference but to meet the people, especially Mavis Ford, and folks at Gweru. Joy spent four years in Kenya in the 1980's, and was a real blessing as she came to Banket and Gwarati, meeting people on the farm churches. We were able to get 100kgs of stuff onto Qantas free of excess rates and distribute shoes and socks to farm pastors, and leave clothing for the main base to distribute, plus a large case of educational stuff and clothes for the Sparrows Nest orphanage in Mozambique. We also took all our Church's collected missions' offerings with us. It was substantial, and received with joy!

The need is accelerating beyond belief. The inflation rate has hit 540% - that's 1.5% per day, and the locals simply cannot factor that into their wage adjustments... The cost of staple foods (mealie, bread, sugar, cooking oil, etc) is spiralling beyond the reach of the ordinary people with no access to forex. Our hearts went out to them more than ever. You feel so helpless to help in any substantial way materially, and do what you can do.

But the Word of God is not chained! The gospel is freely honoured and proclaimed without restraint. So, we travelled up to Banket and Gwarati, onto farms that have been taken over and left unutilised. The farm churches have been severely restricted by the removal of several Christian farmers who were funding the farm pastors. BUT, at Gwarati, following on from a word I felt God give me last year, we rejoiced to find a flourishing congregation consisting of over 75% new converts from the "re-settlers" (sometimes wrongly called "war veterans" - who are another more controlling group of cadres). There they were, young adults, praising God and joined as one with some of the remaining farm workers (now unemployed, but who have nowhere else to move and live).

Peter Zulu declared it was like a second harvest beginning in place of the initial revival in the district some years ago which saw many, many farm churches established. Peter is still having trouble with a growth in his bladder and we just heard today (Dec 12) that he has to have surgery to remove his bladder or it will become life-threatening quickly. This will cost an enormous amount of money (about $A5000 - which last month amounted to $Z20 million! Anyone out there who can help save this precious man's life - help!

The Zulus surrendered two bedrooms so both Joy and I could stay with them - they are like that... So open-hearted. And this was with their son and daughter-in-law and one week old baby living there as well!

The main reason for the second trip in the same year was to participate in a Lifeline network leaders 3-day gathering in Harare. It was very profitable, and we finished with a wonderful meal together at a restaurant walking distance down the road (not that anyone walked!). The photo shows Brian acting like the Lord at the Last Supper (we were trying to work out who Judas was...). (Later note... this was an event of great significance to Brian, as unbeknown to any of us, it would be the last time Brian would be with his brother, Peter Zulu. Within two months, the cancer that had made him so ill, flared up and killed him. A true shamwari and mukoma - gone home far too early...

HOLROYD NEW LIFE 2002 LIFELINE SOUTHERN AFRICA VISIT UPDATES

24/7/02 UPDATE #1 Hello from beautiful, fragrant Beira, Mozambique, where you hope the wind stays on shore….! (you have to be here to understand why). We hope the canvas of life here comes across sharp and fresh as you read this!

We flew into Zimbabwe via Joburg (none flies direct now), then up to Harare where Lifeline, the relief and missions agency our church has worked with for 20 years is based. We had a very beneficial recovery time the last 4 days here in Harare before we left for three weeks of Doulos training courses and travelling between the various places. Our health is good (no food poisoning this time!), the weather is wonderful, and we had a great time catching up with the Lifeline directors, Loxley and Mavis Ford. Brian spent a long time with Edmore, one of the Lifeline Zimbabwean leaders. It is the first time we had seen him since his terrible car accident. He is recovering slowly. He lost almost all of his right hand, and the prosthesis is more cosmetic rather than functional for gripping things. He has had to learn to write left-handed, and can't drive because the whole of his right hand and palm is gone apart from his thumb.

Elizabeth has been out walking and talking with Mavis Ford, the wife of the Sthn Africa Lifeline Director (Loxley Ford). Good cappuccinos are hard to come by here, but they walk anyway! Life in Africa - last year all the street signs had been stolen for aluminium cooking utensils! Now they are putting up plastic ones… A few weeks ago thieves cut down all the phone wires in the street where the Harare base is and carried them off! But when the phone went down again, the fault was at the Exchange (again). We take so much for granted in Oz. Life here is not as dangerous as our media makes out (unless you're a farmer, then it's very tense)…

Oh yes, by the way, the Lifeline truck now sports a big Sydney Swans Aussie Rules sticker on its back window!

We crossed the border late afternoon Sunday after the 300 km drive from Harare. Then another two hours down to Gondola, the town known for its enormous graveyard of rusting old steam railway engines. It's an amazing sight! We walked among them last night and Loxley was a boy with lots of large, very large, toys!

This is the first Doulos course here and is being put on with the sponsorship of a pastor who has lived here since before the Portuguese fled in 1975 and the 17 year-long civil war erupted. He is such an interesting man to listen to. He bought his house, then the Communists took it off him and he has been renting it for about 25 years! Now they have offered to sell it back to him again. The catch has been if you do any repairs, upkeep, etc, they want more money for it. And the Communists have done no repairs, as landlords themselves, in the past 25 years. So, you can imagine the state of the houses. They are unbelievable. Loxley arranged for three light globes and wires to be hung off the roof so they could see at night. The state of decay everywhere is far worse than Beira. It overwhelms you. The sights, the stench. At lunch, a dog, a cat, and then a goat wandered past our table in the dining room. The water supply broke down for the whole town. That was only five years ago and they are going to fix it real soon now…. So, you use borehole water, hand pump it up and then bucket it into the house….

We are staying at Maforga orphanage just up the road (run by an ex-pat Aussie and his wife). It has about 150 people living in the bush with all sorts of projects going. They are out of money so breakfast consists of bread, honey or jam (no margarine today), and tea. And that's it. The civil war went through here several times and the orphanage leaders were kidnapped by Renamo in the late 1980's and force-marched for many weeks across Mozambique. It's quite an amazing story, as the guerrilla leader became a committed Christian as a result of this and is now one of the head foremen at Maforga!

Our course went well. The power was off after a hailstorm the night before, but no worries, it came on mid-afternoon. The public toilets next to the church are a sight all ladies would die for… The men's long drop (hole in the floor) is at least on top of the ground, because the ladies has sunk into the cesspit over the years and is now 1.5 metres sunk into the ground! Elizabeth wouldn't go near it! Next to them, an old leper who has only stumps where his hands (wrists only now) and feet (ankles gone) once were, makes a living shaping and selling leftover timber. His name is Thomas, and the owners of Maforga built him a small one-room cottage years ago and he has become a local identity. There are cripples and maimed people everywhere. John Moyo tells us landmines still go off and maim people. It is all we can do to cope emotionally. The need is so vast and we are so small. But at least we have had the opportunity to minister to some 40 local leaders who can do something longterm for the needy there.

Today (Wed), we set out for Beira (3 hours drive away, where we do another two full days Thursday and Friday, before the long drive back to Harare Saturday. On the way down, we stopped to see an old friend from previous visits. Daniel Caetano. He and his wife have pastored in Nhamatanda, 100km inland from Beira for 30 years. On our previous visits, he has caught the shaperzays (jam-packed old bomb minibuses) down and back daily for the seminars. He's our age, speaks excellent English, and has a keen sense of humour. Today, he had some extra houseguests living with him - over 30 orphans! They started caring for a few orphans a while ago as the AIDS epidemic spread, then people started dropping unwanted, and/or single parent children at his door. He has started building an orphanage on his property, but ran out of money before the roof went on. The building will house over 40 children, but in the meantime, they are using their entire house to sleep the orphans on the floor at night! Heck! And this man is 56! I tried to put myself in his shoes, and I couldn't. Talk about putting your faith into action! They have the cement roofing but no rafters yet. About the cost of a night out for four in a Sydney restaurant would cover it….

We have been quite overwhelmed being here - more so than Beira ever has hit us, and that was hard enough. Please, folks, don't ever complain about your lot in life or else we will bring you here, and believe us, you will never complain again! About anything!

We hope this doesn't sound too preachy, or too much like a travelogue, or like a bleeding-heart guilt-tripper. But, we sure hope your heart is touched by what we send. Hakuna wah kaita sa Jesu! Regards from the Rensfords (Brian and Elizabeth).

1/8/02 UPDATE #2 Since our previous Update, we have been travelling, teaching, and experiencing life in most unusual circumstances… This trip is very different from our previous visits. But, there is only so much we can openly relay...

We drove south from Harare to Gweru, a cold, windswept, rural city in the middle of Zimbabwe. There we conducted our third Doulos program with a small group of local pastors in a high-density residential area. It was like no other location! The roof was half-built, the floors were dirt, there was no glass in any window so they were covered with tarpaulins and sheets of rusty corrugated iron, and the back wall was made of hessian cloth. There was no power, but we did have a blackboard! Yeah, but no proper seats, just bits of wood and iron tied together.

Gweru Doulos site! dirt floors,

iron windows.. latest chairs,

and no back wall. It was rough!

Yet, the men were terrific to relate to! We loved spending time with them. They had very able minds and we got into many deep and serious discussions. And we went with them to two house meetings; one was in a tiny two-room shack where the wife had given her life to Christ a month ago. People were jammed in the lounge / dining / kitchen room (3m x 3m). The next night was in another part of the township (it has 20 village areas called Mkoba 1 to 20!), and we got lost in the rabbit warren of small roads! The house there was very well appointed and much larger. We have had a far greater liberty in praying for the sick and oppressed and have seen God do some wonderful things. The pastors relayed back later several reports of healing and release - including the best one of all - a very old 80 y/o mama who was greatly touched by God as we ministered to her.

This is an area we were concerned about before we came - to add actions to the teaching and instruction side of what we are involved in. We have seen God's provision, demonic agitation, many sick people reaching out and being ministered to (especially babies and children), and you can't help but be moved by the need. There are few medical resources available to ordinary folks here. So, they reach out to Jesus just like the people in Galilee 2000 years ago.

The queue for mealie (the staple diet) was a km long at the food market yesterday. It breaks your heart. The nation is not really in a bad drought; it is a distribution issue, and now there are no stored grains left. Diesel is plentiful though.

Thursday, we drove further south to an area near Bulawayo. The farmer who so kindly hosted us is under standby eviction orders and is supposed to be off the land by Aug 10. We have walked into the middle of a most stressed time, as they are older folks and have farmed here for over 40 years and are now waiting to see what happens after D-Day. All their possessions are being catalogued. Some of their personal house staff has taken off (we think, in fear). There are 300 local people living on the property. The farmer is a very committed Christian and has built a large well-appointed church and school facility nearby. We have power there and toilets that work properly! (long drops of course; they are Blair toilets - and if you know Africa - Mr Blair (no, not Tony!) was a British engineer who invented an odour-free air-circulating long drop dunny! Thank God for Mr Blair! Elizabeth loves him (especially after Mozambique!)….

Our host has a very large and stately home with a ferocious boer-bull guard dog that prevents us from strolling in the well-appointed gardens! So, we walked around the farm this morning, with good old Brian greeting the locals (Ndebele tribe) with "lichoneelee", and getting smiles but puzzled looks. And then discovering he's saying "good afternoon / evening" to people at 7am!!! The house is like something out of Sunset Boulevard; what a change from Gweru! And the tents we will be sleeping in at Binga in the bush in two weeks! So, we are making the most of their kindness and hospitality until we leave in another two days.

8/8/02 UPDATE #3 Hello again from Harare. Elizabeth and I have just returned from Chinhoyi, 120km north of here, where we finished the fifth Doulos course at 4 this afternoon. We have kept excellent health this trip; thank the Lord, and are very appreciative to everyone who has been praying for us. We walk and pray every day, and have really enjoyed this time. It's been quite exhausting as we are near the end of a three-week series of five programs with a lot of travelling between them. We have had no rest days at all; it's been either travel and / or teaching long hours. But, the Holy Spirit has carried us along.

some Chinhoyi students - great bunch to be with!

Chinhoyi church noticeboards - showing impact of program from previous courses' graduates

left and above - we recognised many of the leaders from their involvement in previous Doulos courses.

This trip, we have been crying out to God for more effectiveness in ministry fulfilment of the principles taught. And God has been breaking through. We have seen more healings and people stepping out in prophecy for the first time. In the last Doulos course in Chinhoyi, there are 10 students living in for 2 weeks, and we (wrongly) assumed they were all baptised in the Holy Spirit. Last night, we had six baptised in the Holy Spirit, with release in tongues. And then some in prophecy and one in a (very biblical) vision too. On the coming weekend, we are back at Banket at the annual Heroes' Long Weekend farm convention for all the farm churches in the area. They get between 1500 - 6000 come. This is the one that last year got canned because of the troubles, and we were moved into the township for safety reasons. But things have settled down a lot (despite what the foreign media may say), and they are all looking forward to gathering on a Christian farmer's property. This godly man provides a large meeting area and accommodation huts for everyone. Amazing.

Today is the day all the farmers are supposed to be off their properties, but a lot are staying put, many with the quiet approval of local authorities. After the farm convention, we drive a long way the next day into the bush to take some seminars for rural church leaders near Lake Kariba. It's a bad malaria area, but at least the elephants are not raiding their crops this year (like last year when their leaders came down to Doulos!). We may even get to hunt kudu with Peter Zulu!!

To finish off…. What strikes us forcefully is the number of fresh graves everywhere in the public cemeteries. It's unbelievable, and really does bring the AIDS epidemic home in your face. This is very different from good old Aussie…

17/8/02 UPDATE #4 The last week has been one of the most interesting (and somewhat weirdest of our lives!). This report (like the others) respects the particular sensitivities of the current situation. Our week went like this…

We drove the 100 kms to the farm convention very early Sunday morning. Numbers were way down again. The particular location is a listed property for a Section 8 resumption which comes into effect very soon. Already, there are 35 resettled families of settlers occupying the farm, lining the track into the convention area. This made it very interesting for us (being varungu - white foreign people), but Elizabeth and I went for a (prayed up!) walk among them during Sunday and greeted people in Shona along the way - without incident. Several of these people (some media call them war veterans, but they are not; they are resettled people) came up and attended the meetings (more on that in a later report….). Brian urged the local Christians to reach out to these dislocated and resettled people, as they are candidates for "who is my neighbour?" evangelism. It was a "quite exciting" time of ministry!

Loxley and Brian taught in the morning sessions, then we went to lunch with the farm's resident pastor, Peter Banda, whom we have had fellowship with before several times. His house stands alone nearby, and they lost their kitchen and storehouse huts in a grass fire recently (the amount of burn-off here drives us nuts as Aussies; it's an obsession! The land is scorched for miles everywhere in winter, not just bush areas, but in the towns too….).

The night meeting went on under portable generator power, and in the middle of the dancing (you have to understand that a meeting isn't a meeting here without lots of dancing!), as the dust swirled off the dry ground, we looked up from the platform we were sitting on to see a tractor and water cart chugging up the farm road. He drove right across in front of the platform (the area in the photo), into the middle of where a hundred plus people were dancing out the front and proceeded to hose down the dust while the music continued! We have never seen a service like this in our lives!!! Yet, it was a wonderful night of colour, worship, under the stars, preaching and ministry. We prayed (encouraging the farm pastors to join us) for around 200 people for healing, salvation, baptism in the Holy Spirit, etc. A demonised young woman fell backwards and after lying still for 30 minutes began to thrash around on the ground. Immediately a group of leaders (men and women) attended to her with ministry. As we finished praying for people, I asked our host, Peter Zulu (the Coordinator and senior minister of the farm churches network) if everything was OK, to which he replied in a classic understatement, "yes, she is OK now; the Intensive Care team are now looking after her…."

We also spent time in the afternoon with the farm owners, who have so graciously provided the facilities. Every year they re-thatch the hedges around the toilets, wash areas, cooking pits, and the meeting facility. It all worked very well! Yes folks, you can squat here in clean surroundings! They even bring clean water to all the facilities on big tractor carts (no dunny paper here unless you bring your own!) The owners are on standby to leave the farm after 22 years, and have not done any farming since Christmas. It was a sad occasion, and gave us insight into things from the inside. They are greatly loved by the local Christian community (mostly farm workers, many of whom are now losing their jobs now that farm work has ceased).

Then, after a night at Peter and Martha's home in the township (no drums this Heroes' weekend - unlike the incessant noise last year), we stayed at Chinhoyi to use up the last night of our prepaid motel accommodation that we had not used for the local Doulos program the week before. It was lovely! And empty… A very basic, but clean place, and we walked all through the (large) town where last year no murungu would be seen on the streets because of the tension after 21 farmers were arrested and jailed. The difference this year was amazing. We really love walking around among the local people. Brian's Shona has improved a lot, and it draws a friendly response most times.

On Tuesday, Loxley and Peter loaded up their 4WD's and we drove to one of the most remote areas of the country. There were only 110 kms of unsealed road, but the corrugations on the last 60 km are unbelievable! The gravel ruts were so high you wouldn't get a car through. We pitched camp in the bush just inside Matusadonha NP (15km from where the Pommie tourist got dragged out of his tent and eaten by a shumba (lion) two years ago!). And here we were - in flimsy tents! We spent three nights there listening to every noise in the dark! Cowards that we are! A hyena visited us two nights. Peter opened his flap and roared at it in Shona from about 2 metres! Momma mia! Kudu (large deer) called from nearby one night, but no shumba… We were told the second day that there are currently lions all over the place. One killed a donkey 2 kms away a week or so before. And on the second morning, one of the local Christians who came over to see us said he had passed some elephants up the road (they go after the local farmers' plots). No wonder we felt like we didn't sleep peacefully!... And no drinks after 5pm, coz there's no way we were going outside the tent for a pee after going to bed! The locals said the tourist did that and the lion followed him back into his tent later on the same night...

our flimsy campsite in shumba territory! A test of nerve...	children everywhere!	night service was packed (albino boy worshipping...).	the men watched on through holes in the walls...
Peter Zulu at Vumai's church	Brian addresses the leaders	Peter Zulu interpreted	Open air church at Vumai's; they had 2 buildings

We had meetings with two of the local pastors' people and another two with their leaders (all three had been in our Doulos course last year, where they had invited us to visit their area). But Vumai (the one whose worn-out socks adorn our church noticeboard and African room at home!) was out chasing his lost donkey…. Sounds like something out of the Old Testament… We had never seen so many babies! The place was crawling with children. Lifeline distributed clothing both places we visited. This is one of the poorest areas of Zimbabwe. They are living on Christian food aid (the elephants steal most of their crops every year), and we left all the clothing we had brought in our spare cases too. Brian gave away half his clothes again. You can't help it when you see the poverty. And the hardship…. One night, a man brought his son to our bush camp. The 11 y/o had just been attacked by a spitting cobra, which had spat venom into his eyes. We had no medicine, but Loxley was able to wash the venom out with copious water, and pray for him. He recovered noticeably. This stuff overwhelms you and you determine again NEVER to complain about Medicare availability at home!

night-time handover of clothing gifts to pastors for distributing	Peter (Doulos student) danced before he interpreted for Brian	Robson's family - his daughter (2nd left) read excellently	Robson's leaders
The Zulu boys played off their portable generator; Tambudzai led the singing	Robson's church meeting	these bus stop signs adorned 100km of the road!	Puncture #2; village just "happened" to have tyre levers!

To top it all off, we spent one day driving on the worst road we have ever seen in our entire lives (no kidding) into Taschinga in the NP. It was a trip to remember. The back window popped out of the HiLux cab, because of the vehicle twisting on the riverbeds, rocks, etc. But it brought us out to the most magnificent piece of bush on the edge of Lake Kariba (nearly 300km long and up to 50km wide). A Christian missions' group of 20 young people were stranded in a riverbed 20 km from the road-end, where their big 4WD truck had snapped a diff. The young people had pitched their tents on the sand and were waiting for some tools to arrive. They would be there for two days minimum doing the African thing - waiting…

At Taschinga, we walked into a control zone with 5 black rhino which are part of a protection program - with two armed rangers, we hasten to add! Spent an hour at close range watching them (like, from only 20 meters away)… A marvellous sight. One ranger had just killed a lion, which had attacked him at night in the dark. He heard it creeping up on him and his keen hearing saved his life as it leapt at him. The shumba are so numerous they have chased much of the game into the mountains we crossed to get there. So, on the way out, up high, we drove into a very closely-bunched herd of buffalo (an indication of lions nearby). No. the lions didn't bite us, but Elizabeth copped two tsetse fly bites (they follow the buffalo). By the time we drove out of the track it was right on dark, and boy, were we glad to head back to the camp. A day we will never forget.

At least in the bush there were no mozzies (and therefore, no malaria). But mopane flies! They make our Aussie ones look like amateurs. They are small and crawl in your eyelids! We slept on thin backpacker foam sheets, and remembered we are too old to be doing this… Coupled with the nervousness we had over the presence of lions, we didn’t sleep much at all! Peter Zulu didn’t help by telling us of the time he was camping in the bush when a male lion roared at them from (a tiny) 15 metres away; he turned and saw its red eyes in the firelight, before everyone broke the world short-course sprint record by leaping into the Land Rover, where all 5 of them spent the night huddled together! Singing songs like, "fear not" just doesn't help in such times…

On the drive out, we got three punctures between the two vehicles (an indication of how rough the "main" road was! They couldn't move the wheel nuts the first time (the tools didn't fit), and Brian saved them with some old Kiwi fix-anything-with-a-piece-of-fencing-wire creativity! It took us a whole day to get back to Harare. We were all exhausted, as the Binga district is also the hottest part of Zimbabwe. It was up over 30 every day.

This has gone too long, but we hope you catch something of what it's been like. I (Brian) lay in our tent the last night, listening to the sounds of the bush, and thought of my early years growing up in Auckland NZ in a housing commission area, with a mother who loved to read to my brothers and me stories of Africa and adventure, never dreaming that one day I would be privileged enough by God to actually go, not as a tourist, but to be involved in things that have significance, and to grow in ability to relate to the people as my brothers and sisters in Christ. I am so grateful for the exposure I had years ago to many Maori people, who unknowingly were teaching me things that have been so very useful here. Our lives have truly been blessed by our Saviour…

#5 Final Update from home
G'day from the Rensfords at Joburg airport - waiting for that lovely Qantas plane to fly us to Perth. We spent the last week driving down from Harare, and covered more than 2500km - because we got the wobbles once we crossed the border out of Zimbabwe and veered across to Kruger National Park and the majestic Drakensberg mountains. After the past 5 weeks up north, this week was a holiday, despite the travelling. We spent three glorious days in Kruger and couldn't believe how well Sth Africans run things. Graded roads in place of corrugated goat tracks, and so on. We saw so much wild game (couple of photos attached for proof. We stayed in very comfortable quarters and were lastly looked after by the operators of Emmanuel Press in White River (330km from Joburg) in their guest accommodation. We attended a black church that meets next door that has one white member - Loreen Newington, the 81 y/o widow of David Newington. They came out from Scotland to Africa in 1945 and founded Emmanuel Press, which continues to produce Christian literature in over 100 African languages! She is a real sharp old lady!

above - hippos in Kruger NP huddled for warmth in the cool weather

we (4) stayed in this twin chalet for 4 nights with the majestic Drakensberg mountains as a backdrop

the main peak in this part of the Drakensberg Mtns rises to 1950m. View here from the road frontage to the chalets. An awesome sight!

We breakfasted on the terrace, overlooking the far plains of Kruger

above - Blyde River lake lookout

left - giraffe brush-cutter in action in Kruger NP...

this car spares business sits on the edge of a township, with 2 cars only! But what a backdrop!

three Rondavels - so similar to the 3 Sisters in our own Blue Mountains

Brian mentioned we had both been influenced many years ago in our Ministry Training College by Jean "Granny" Beruldsen from Scotland; Granny had come to Australia via a long stint in China as missionaries from Edinburgh AoG in the early 1930's. Loreen's eyes lit up and she exclaimed, "Jean was my youth leader before they left Scotland!" What an amazingly small world… She told us a lot about Granny's background that we weren't aware of. Yeah, heaven will be one big reunion!…

That's it, folks. Hope you have a clearer picture of things over there from what we have sent you. One last hearty thank you once again to everyone who has prayed for us. Oh has it been so noticeable! In health, in protection, in spiritual safety in a highly demonised environment, in "chance" encounters with people, in Christian contact and opportunities to express in practical ways, God's great love for all mankind. Hakuna wah kaita sa Jesu!

And there's more information on Lifeline's work in Southern Africa on www.hnlc.org.au/lifeline

2001 Trip Reports

2/8 Update #1

What a start to my fourth trip to Africa in the last four years! And I can't even blame African hygiene! After four days ministry with New Life Churches in Perth, WA, I came down with violent food poisoning on the flight from Joburg to Harare a day later. Never eat prawns on a flight… After arriving in Joburg, I found Debbie already had landed direct from Sydney, and Sherry McLean, our very gracious host arrived soon afterwards. Next morning she dropped us at the airport, and bingo! Brian is staring at the ceiling… An agonising stop in Harare's brand new airport for two hours (spent running to the washroom regularly), and the Hess's rescued us (I had given Loxley the wrong flight arrival time). They took us home and I spent the next three days giving new meaning to runner's hit-outs… Sometimes not making it in time…

My gut is rumbling as I write this. I am taking up a special offering to cover the cost of toilet paper I have used the past three days. I am in some pain from gas and diarrhoea. Debbie is advising me on what I should eat and how little. I feel like Paul with Luke, the personal physician In tow! She was a great help actually, while I wanted to die. It's no joy cleaning the dunny - walls and all - at 2am, and having a quick bath at 4am… I am definitely NOT called to India, where I understand this kind of rapid weight reduction program is quite common…

Thank God for the three days here to get oriented. It seems this bug has been slower to dislodge than I had reckoned on. Last night I had to leap out of bed 4 times and race to the dunny - twice too late, and had to clean myself up yet again. I feel like a 2 y/o. So, the three days recovery in Harare before heading down to Mozambique was a godsend. Recovered while our Mozambican visas were processed, then off to the downhill descent to Dante's Inferno! [back to update list].

9/8 Update #2

I have recovered really well and thank the many who prayed for me while I spend lots of time on the throne. For the past five days we have been involved in the Doulos training program for pastors in the port city of Beira, in Mozambique. The effects of the 17 years long civil war are still everywhere, although signs of recovery are starting to show. They were expecting about 15 pastors and leaders to turn up and everyone was quite amazed when some 45 came - most for the whole three days! This gave us quite an extended opportunity to present elements of the course which balances development of ministry with character issues - something that was sadly lacking in former days in this place. (The ministers' fraternal leader died of AIDS a few years ago!).

Debbie is slowly recovering from the culture shock of Beira! She spoke at two midweek meetings and did quite well tonight (after I told her to slow down - her Aussie accent was losing the interpreter…). They now have replaced pulpit candles with kero lamps (so it's harder to set fire to your Bible!).

Afterwards we walked across the courtyard to pray with the widow of a brother who was buried yesterday. Everyone left some money. She lives in one room! Such poverty, yet the church has been very kind to her. It was very moving, being in a darkened room with only one small candle for light, praying for a woman who has nearly nothing. It is so much closer to NT life (and need and death) here than at home. You get dragged back to the basics without the frills of Western religion.

We return to two more week-long courses in Zimbabwe. One in a rural area where transport is especially difficult, and the other in Bulawayo - second city of Zimbabwe. I am supposed to be speaking with Loxley at a Conference in the first area before Doulos starts, but circumstances have developed that are making arrangements rather difficult. Please pray that we may have God's guidance for the next week especially. Debbie is staying in Harare with Mavis, for the first three days before she joins the team at Doulos. Peter Zulu is going to shoot some kudu to feed the pastors who gather for the two weeks! (They are a large local deer). Boy! This beats our Aussie way of doing things!

Update from Harare Thursday night - we arrived back after a slow 12 hour trip from Beira. The trip was relatively uneventful (this means the border crossing went AOK and we had no near misses). A car from Barnabas ministries (USA) passed us twice in Mozambique, but we caught him 145 km out from Harare. Turned out they had been given dirty fuel and their car was travelling along in fits and starts at 40kph. The American is due to fly out early tomorrow so we took him on board with us and dropped him at his stopover house nearby here. He was so grateful after starting to get concerned about making it (his luggage had disappeared coming into Africa too). Here everyone helps everyone (there are not a lot of cars on the highways).

And where would we be without the wonders of the Internet even in Africa, where we can sit stunned at the joyous news that the Sydney Swans walloped rivals the Kangaroos by 107 points last weekend! And my footy tips can still be sent in… What a strange world we're now living in… Thanks again to everyone praying for us. The ministry itinerary we sent out last week is still current. Regards from Brian [back to update list].

17/8 Update #3

Dear everybody. Last weekend, Loxley, Moses and I were 100km from Harare for two days where Loxley and I were the speakers at a combined churches convention in a commercial farming area. We left Debbie with Mavis in Harare, as it was "Heroes Long-Weekend", a public holiday when revolutionary heroes of the war of Independence are honoured nationwide. The situation has been extremely tense here; it is the same area you may have heard that 20 farmers were arrested and jailed just days before, after some were alleged to have assaulted some new settlers who had moved onto one farm. We have had to be extremely careful.

When we drove into the area, the senior minister was waiting for us on the highway before the town. It turned out an older (white) man had just been attacked and badly beaten right outside the building we will be using this coming week for Doulos, and he did not think it safe for us to call in there. So, we drove past straight to his house in the (African) township further down the road.

Rocks were thrown on our roof Saturday night. The pastor says this happens from time to time. The drums beat all around us all night (literally!) Sat. and Sun. as people brewed beer in honour of their ancestors and to call in their spirits to join them in their houses. We are told that for some reason August is the busiest month for this activity. I found it a not-restful spiritual atmosphere, to put it mildly…. There was a palpable presence of demonic forces. BUT ALSO, God's abundant, sufficient, superior presence too!

The meetings have been a great time of noise, celebration, and worship! Because of transport and safety problems, they were moved off a farm where they normally have over 1500 people come together, to the local township's church building, where there is only room for 400 to 500. The place was jammed. My ears are still ringing! But I got my own back, by teaching them "an Aussie song" both days - both ones Marcus Leiman taught us at home in Shona. This delighted them! They knew them of course, but I made them sing without the ever-present loud distorting keyboards, and the harmony settled into a beautiful bass (men) soprano (women) and me somewhere in the middle, leading out the first word of each line in true African style! Marcus would have been proud of me! I felt like the white kid in the jail scene in the film, the Power of One!

Five days later - the situation has quieted down somewhat, but there is tension in the air. Farmhouses have been looted nearby and the Government has announced additional police protection for the district. I have been for a jog twice - but made sure I am never in sight of the main highway. Such a pity as the area is so fertile and the local people so friendly. The official reports are blaming criminal elements from Harare for the violence and damage. But I had my first ever in four trips experience of racist antagonism when a young man walked past the Doulos property and spat at me in Shona, "are you a farmer?!?" Moses interpreted and was not impressed either.

We ate kudu (a large deer) two nights; delicious! Peter Zulu has promised to take me hunting next visit up near Matusadonha (you may remember the poor Pommie tourist up there who left his tent open last year and got eaten by a lion!).

Debbie arrived up Monday with Mavis, Loxley's wife. She is getting on well with the female students attending this Doulos course. The hotel the course is located in is a grand relic of former times. Large, spacious, and partly renovated. Peter Zulu and his family have given up two rooms of their home to accommodate Debbie too, now she has arrived. They are such gracious hosts. He is rebuilding the Land Rover that was wrecked in April - using crude equipment, the locals are resurrecting it from the dead! Quite amazing.

The course is going well. I am doing similar material to last year, on "handling the Bible correctly" and this time looking at the automatic bias in all of us from our family, social, tribal, and national conditioning. Today, in my last session before we drive back to Harare tonight, I covered getting your "feet washed daily by your fellow slaves". We had some real fun doing this - practising reclining at table a la 1^st C AD, and keeping our left hand away from the table and food, explaining the Latin for left hand is sinister!

Debbie has taken some lectures and done the Doulos material justice! She is starting to settle into an African framework of time, relationships, and joy…. The week has been tense, but fulfilling, and the bonds built we hope will endure. The student numbers were more than halved by the trouble and transport situation.

One last cameo to give you an idea of what pastors from this part of the world face…. You will never complain again, believe me! I brought again spare clothes and shoes from home to fill up my airline luggage limit. Peter Zulu recommended certain students (several are older men) who do it hard. One comes from an area where they never have enough food because the elephants come in and raid their crops! I found that a pair of good quality running shoes Jim Barr gave me to pass on fitted him perfectly. He was so thrilled. I told him he needed to wear socks to stop the inside of the shoes wearing away (like the ones he had on). At which point he pulled a worn pair of socks out from under his soles in the shoes and put them on. Only thing was - they had no bottoms! They were completely worn away; there was only the part over the top of his feet and ankle left. I said to him he needed to make sure he used full socks when he got home (several hundred kms away) to stop the new shoes wearing away. He looked at me embarrassed and said, "these are my only socks"…. What could I do? Heck, I have three pairs of thick running socks with me. Ummm, isn't that what 1 John 3:17-18 says? If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth. Man, this stuff comes home with a whack… How easy we have it at home. I don't feel guilty about this, but where I can make a difference, I have no other option if I love God. So I did a sock swap with him, so I can bring his home and show our church what pastors in Africa put up with without complaining!

If you believe in the power of prayer, please pray for us as we go by bus to Bulawayo for a week, and then three of us go by train to Vic Falls for four days. This will probably be our last opportunity to send an update out. [back to update list].

23/8 Update #4

Hello, everyone. We're near the end of our time here and I hope you have found these Updates of some interest in what is a very different part of the world to what we consider as "normal". This Saturday night, we finish our time in Bulawayo, Moses Koroka arrives to join us, and we climb on an overnight train to Victoria Falls. Four days of seeing the part of Zimbabwe tourists are more familiar with, and then we split up. I return home, Moses catches a bus back to Harare, and Debbie flies on to London for two weeks.

Debbie is doing really well on this third Doulos program. She is now teaching and leading discussion groups every afternoon, and the students are relating to her really well. This one has about 13 women in it - mostly younger ones, and they relate to her very well. You should have seen her helping cook the sudza yesterday! They were amazed she would offer to help in the kitchen.

Things are much safer here racially, but there is a high criminal risk in this area after dark. One of the girls had a knife at her throat 150 meters from here coming to the session just after dark.

The people here are doing it really hard. Honestly, you would never moan again. When we arrived, the 20+ students had been living on sudza for lunch, no morning or afternoon tea (not even tea or cordial), sudza and cabbage for dinner. No sauce, relish, meat, no fruit, no coffee or tea, no dessert. Debbie and I looked at each other and said, "how can we stay in George's house (the course is being held next door in a church hall) and eat ordinary portions, while these students aren't getting enough for basic health?" So, we asked how much to add meat, and some vegetables to the menu for 20+ students. Now they have these things and are happy, and you know what it cost us? For 4 days? Eleven Australian dollars each! You can hardly call that sacrificial giving can you?? Several of the students have been battling illnesses here. Mosquitoes are out in force, and although this is not a strong malaria district (like where we're going Sunday is), you have to cover up carefully.

Oh yeah, and the male students are sleeping on carpet pieces on concrete floors in the old servants' quarters…. Don't tell me they're not keen to learn and grow! And in all this, none of them complain… I've been trying to translate this to Australia if we tried to run a training program like Doulos in these conditions…. I can't!

I have been doing my biased, our-own-culture's "normal" values system to "kingdom normal" series, and things came alive yesterday especially - on the subject of spiritual warfare and ministering deliverance - this is in their face all the time in this culture. We discussed how to counter the "mhondoro" (district ruling spirits), and the "flies" that work under their authority.

Wadzanai preached Tuesday night. She is the young lady some of you have heard of through Moses Koroka courting her. Man, she has an exceptional gift! A very keen-for-God young lady, and well spoken. Moses knows what he is doing there… Now he needs only 10 mombees (cows) or $Z200,000 ($A2200) for her lobola - bride price - and he can marry her! It will take a miracle provision in this economic depression, where they don't even have enough money to properly feed themselves.

Every time I come here, I go home and say, "I will never complain about anything in Aussie again!" This time, I'm saying it with double the sincerity! This morning, about 6.15, I set out on my normal morning prayer walk, to be greeted by the sight of several men patrolling the streets, before the garbage truck collected the rubbish, sifting through the household garbage bins.

Lastly, thanks once again to everyone who has prayed constantly for us here. We have been conscious of the support - honestly. I am writing this in my room before going to take my first session for the day. The students are next door, and the sound of their incredible singing has been drifting through my window. I wish I could take you here just to be moved by the depth of their sincere worship, the marvellous harmonies of their voices, and the sheer joy they express in their unrestrained singing.

6/9 (Final) Update #5

G'day, again. Update #4 was sent out through an Internet café in Bulawayo. It seems it didn’t get through - that's Africa! So, we have sent this off as our last communication - in html, so the updates can be scrolled through if you didn't receive previous one(s).

The trip was "edgy" in places. We were encouraged by Debbie's comment before leaving Australia, "the safest place is right where God wants you to be"…. But our hearts went out continually to the folks we encountered whose economic base is very tough right now. I gradually gave away all my clothes, shoes, and other stuff, returning home with the stuff I was wearing + my "Sunday" shirt and pants. And that was after filling my luggage allowance with spare clothes from home. How could you do otherwise???

On a brighter note, for the last five days, I took Moses and Debbie to some of the most beautiful country in the whole world - Victoria Falls, where we stayed NOT in the $A250 pp / per night hotels, but in the $A3 pp/pn 1960's lodges on the beautiful Zambesi River inside the National Park! And that's motel-style accommodation!

Three of us caught the overnight train and travelled first class from Bulawayo to Victoria Falls! Only trouble was the carriages haven't been repaired in over 20 years… But we saw a whole host of wild life from the train the last 3 hours as the train was late (normal). It averaged 30 kmh for 15 hours…

Once at the Falls, we found a very helpful solo safari operator, who ended up ferrying us around for the four days for an agreed fee, much cheaper than the local taxis and heaps cheaper than the $US75/day for a tiny rental car! So we had our four days r 'n' r - doing a 14 hour safari one day on our own with our guide, Sam. We saw 26 species, including leopard, eagle catching a snake (he said National Geographic wait years to catch that on film), lots of placid, bored, and aggressive elephants, and just on nightfall - a pride of five lions wandered out right on cue! Debbie had never been in the bush before; the sight of her taking a flash photo of a male lion at 5 metres was a sight to behold!

While the tourists "roughed" it in the town nearer the Falls (twice the length and height of Niagara), I got the other two to sit quietly on the verandah every night at dusk for a couple of hours as the moon came up, letting the sounds of the bush awaken our (human) spirits, as the animals begin to move around - some small and some BIG - VERY BIG!. A few lodges away (they're separated by large tracts of bush to allow the animals to wander around) a Perth bloke told us how he had backed his little rental car into the parking bay one night, got out, turned around to find a full-grown bull elephant standing over the rear of his car in the dark! It whacked the car roof with its trunk to let him know it wasn't amused at his backing up without noticing it… The last night, before we went our three separate ways, I was woken at 1.30am by an elephant 50m away whacking a palm tree to dislodge the nuts they love to eat!!…. Love it! What a wonderful final memory to have before coming home to a different kind of jungle….

So, once again, thanks so much for staying in touch, praying for us, and being interested in a place and people less fortunate than we are. I hope these cameos help paint a wider portrait of our wonderful God and His heart for His people who are doing it tough in other places.

Effectiveness of the visit? Yeah, very timely, and effective. Picked up quite a lot of Shona phrases (phonetically not unlike Maori). Ndebele? That's something else, with it's clicking sounds! Getting onto the cultural wavelength this time seemed to give our ministry greater impact. The people respond to genuine love and interest in them and their situation. Next year, the brothers want Elizabeth and I to return for a longer period. We will pray about it as we get closer to mid 2002.

Oh, and I managed to "sneak" a seven foot tall giraffe home for Elizabeth… Beautiful woodwork craftsmen!

And oh yeah again! If you want to use our connection to send donations, we know where it goes, how effective it is, and it goes 100%. You can relay any contribution through New Life Church Holroyd's church office, 106A Jersey Rd, Greystanes NSW 2145. We send it quarterly.

2000 VISIT WITH SEKURU BRIAN AND MOMMA ELIZABETH
At the risk of boring you all, we thought you might catch a glimpse of life here through these little cameos we send. It's broken up into sections you can jump to. We hope it gives you a balanced view of this marvellous part of the world; especially after some of the overseas media reports that have given (to us at least) a somewhat unbalanced view of life here at present. We hope these reports help allay some of the fears many of our friends and prayer supporters expressed before we left.

This first bit was written halfway across the Indian Ocean from Perth to Joburg. We had a very busy and enjoyable time in Perth which was marred somewhat a few hours ago by Brian living up to his reputation at being last to arrive at the airport for a flight. We made it with time to spare (but we aren't saying just how much time…). And by the man booking on before us saying his brother and sis-in-law were murdered in Joburg just yesterday. The situation there requires constant appraisal of safety strategies. Our hosts in Perth were pastors originally from Durban and they reiterated the need for extreme caution in Joburg at all times.

23/5 update from Joburg - our hosts Fritzy and Sherry (relatives by marriage) have given us a wonderful look at the "other side" of Johannesburg - quite different to the common reports we get in Aussie. Elizabeth and walked today for an hour around the streets without any cause for concern - just don't take anything with you or wear any fancy stuff. African people are very responsive to public greetings as you pass by them in the street - far more so than at home where everyone looks straight ahead and avoids eye contact!

Fritzy is my father-in-law's 17 y/o grandson, whose mother and sister were blown to bits by an enormous letter bomb in 1985 sent from the old SA Govt's Death Squad. Sherry raised him after his father (re)married later. Their story is the subject of articles in various books, and came up before the SA Truth and Reconciliation Commission last year. Mandela called Fritzy's father (Marius) just three days before he died of lung cancer last year. Marius was an Afrikaaner who was regarded as a traitor by the Afrikaaners because he joined ANC and fought for an end to Apartheid. He was imprisoned in Pretoria for 12 long years. The family is marked by deep pain still. Makes us ever grateful to the freedom we have inherited in Australasia, doesn't it?

Something a little lighter! Brian finally had a breakthrough in the gift of interpretation of tongues - at 5.30am in the morning to be precise. That's after all the guard dogs started barking furiously at 3am. Anyway, we erupted out of sleep to the loud cry of a Muslim Imam around the corner, who was yelling in Arabic, supposedly calling the faithful to prayer. But we just KNEW that at 5.30, in the pitch dark, he was really saying, "all right you lot out there across the street! I can't sleep and I'm gonna make sure none of you can either!". Sherry says they have repeatedly asked him to turn down his newly installed boosted loudspeaker system, but he doesn't. Imagine if someone gave him a beat box and a Celica to drive around in….

26/5 update from Harare - we have now settled in with our hosts, Dave and Jen Hess, who Elizabeth stayed with in Mozambique in 1991. Their church is in the middle of their annual convention - who should be their main speaker last night? Phil Pringle, from Sydney Northern Beaches! He had to follow two hours of African praise, climaxing in a guest appearance by one of Zimbabwe's best known performers, who did a 10 minute+ item that had the whole 4000 congregation movin' and a shakin'!!!! He was their equivalent of John Farnham doing reggae! The way these people move is a sight to behold in itself! Such a contrast to the British background that also lingers on in part here.

The altitude (about 5000 feet ASL) makes jogging difficult for the first few days. We have been walking an hour a day in between commitments. Gasping when we step up the pace. We went in for our visas to Mozambique this morning - last year's application by Brian and Des was an expedition in red tape in itself - worthy of Fawlty Towers - waiting in a queue for four hours, complete with loud arguments, religious discussion, and much frivolity. But this year, after targeted prayer - a miracle happened! We walked in and there were only THREE people present! If you have been to Africa you already know that queues are an integral part of the culture. Time doesn't have the same meaning here. Take your watch off and work by the sun's position in the sky… So this really was a miracle! We walked out (still stunned) in about 15 minutes.

MOZAMBIQUE DOULOS Our week went well with a surprising number of pastors turning up (25) while two other pastors' seminars were on elsewhere in Beira. Some travelled 200km a day round trip on shaperzays to get there. Have a look on the Lifeline page. The city still smells the same! Sewerage city. Some signs of progress are appearing but it's gonna be a long, long haul… There's another shipwreck on the beach!

The amount of aid getting through in the traditional relief networks is pretty well standard for this part of the world. Some gets through, but there are new vehicles driving around with relief organisation signs on them. And much aid is reported to have "disappeared" - as usual. But Lifeline's Ezra project is motoring along in control, with block making going on at our back door here! The main river was 200 kilometres wide at the worst flooding! Can you believe that? The winds measured up to 260 kph!! Elizabeth and I brought into Mozambique an additional $A2000 of support for the ministry here, provided by people outside our own church's support (another $A4000 / $Zim 90,000) which is distributed out from Harare. The people here are so grateful for the support that is shown by people so far away, "who having not seen, you love" This is truly one way of showing God's love across the oceans. Even the pens we brought from Sydney have been gratefully received by pastors who struggle to even buy the small things we take for granted at home.

We set out on Saturday for Bulawayo and the second Doulos Training Course for pastors and leaders. That's 900 km via Mutare stopover and Masvingo. The next two (Bulawayo and Banket) are both in English. Brian's vocal chords took a bit of a pounding in Mozambique with the load of daytime teaching and nighttime preaching. You might pray for us both for continued good health.

MASVINGO STOPOVER We had a bit of a trial in Masvingo, in that our vehicle's oil seal perished over the last 300 kms, AND we were too low on diesel on go on from where we are staying at Masvingo - halfway to Bulawayo (and they had had no diesel deliveries in this district for three weeks). Then we saw God's provision. The vehicle was in the garage for most of the day - they had the right parts (seals, timing belt, diesel filter). That's the first praise point! And what a miserable day it was too, raining all day (most unseasonal in Zimbabwe this time of year), but while we were in there, talking to the supervisor about the repairs, a tanker came in. The queue stretched back for a long way and they were selling 20 litres per vehicle. Brian mentioned we were due in Bulawayo the next day and were nearly out of diesel. The supervisor said the fuel they had would not last the queue (our vehicle was still in bits). But then he asked if we would like 20 litres; Brian said it would sure help. A little later, he asked if 40 would get us there, then 50! He had his men fill 2 large jerry cans, right on the spot. So we ended up with a full tank + 15 extra litres in the back, with no hours of waiting in the queue. This mightn't sound much back home, but here this was a series of miraculous provisions. We were standing in the rain in the driveway stunned. And thankful!

We've talked to a number of farmers since being here and it's a very tense time for them. We've also been told forty hotel/lodges, the ones with arable land, have had their land occupied so of course no-one will come and stay although the accommodation itself has not been taken over. That bit of information, I don't think, has reached our shores. This has not been violent, we add, but is very, very tense.

The main attraction in the Masvingo area we stopped at for two nights en route from Mozambique, are the Zimbabwe Ruins. It's a world heritage site and awesome to walk / climb through. Because our vehicle was in dock, it was 4pm before we could get there yesterday, and raining, but we took a guided tour and ended up tramping all over the place in the dark and wet. It was so surreal… We paid $A7 for a personal guided tour (we were the ONLY visitors to use a guide the whole day - the crisis here has killed tourism dead). Two training female guides came along. The paths to the King's mountain-top enclosure are very, very steep and one of the girls was wearing smooth based sandals! The two trainees were both committed Christians, as was the park ranger. We are staggered how often the Lifeline sign on the vehicle is recognised! The security man at our lodge proudly told us he is completing the Lifeline correspondence course at present! And our head waiter has asked us for a Bible and correspondence material. That's what makes Zimbabwe such a joy to travel about in. So many of the ordinary people have a deep love for our Jesus and a hunger to grow in their understanding.

I (Brian) talked to our guide about cost of living - he earns $Z2500/month (= $A104), gets accomm. but no food. His wife and child are 2 ^1/₂ bus trip away and he spends $Z480 each weekend going there and back. This leaves him the princely sum of $Z600 PER MONTH to live on…. That's $A28! Less than we would spend often on a meal for two. Tipping is not an option here for a believer, it's a compulsion. As so many of these we have met are fellow believers. (top of page)

LATER UPDATE FROM BULAWAYO We tried to send this last update from Masvingo but the "Internet café" wouldn't take it! The power blew up again and my (battery-powered) notebook was the only thing working in the shop! Happens all the time they said….

We have just finished the second Doulos program and are staying in Bulawayo with George Moyo, speaking in his church later today. Brian's cold turned to a badly infected throat and he finished his material in considerable pain, with virtually no voice at all. If delivery counted for anything, the students would have gotten nothing out of it! But they did. They called Elizabeth, Momma Elizabeth! She took the 10 young women attending in separate sessions and they loved it! More secret women's business. Honestly, the Zimbabwean people are the most warm hearted saints we have ever met. They get into your heart so quickly.

War vets invaded a farm nearby two months ago and folks are nervous. We pulled into town late last night to find the neighbour of our host was invaded by robbers the night before while she was home alone. They cut through the razor wire, the window bars, and glass, then stripped the house of virtually everything while the poor woman locked herself in her bedroom. Can you imagine what this does to people's nerves here??? Praise God we found more diesel too. Enough to get us to our next course 480 kms away, and then back to Harare. We are sleeping in our TENTH bed since leaving our own. The last were shockers. You have to feel called to do this stuff in this part of the world…

We had a marvellous time in a four hour service today with George Moyo's church in Bulawayo. They meet out in a "township" area. 300 people jammed in a large simple hall. and did they sing! Brian preached/croaked his way through (they found a PA system just to help him out), and the interpreter seemed to take forever to translate what he was saying. It turned out he was translating into TWO languages - one after the other. This is brilliant! But nobody told us… Shona and Ndebele. And praise God for mercies again - we saw a small queue at a diesel station way out near the township and only had to queue for 10 minutes to fill up again with diesel. Mavis Ford rang to say Harare is totally out of diesel at present. Our hearts went out to a queue of people standing in the dark to obtain a 5 litre can of paraffin for their cooking. The queue was at least three hours long - no kidding. (top of page)

AFTER THIRD DOULOS SERIES AT BANKET - we have been very pressed for time by the intensity of the three week travelling and training schedule here. The chair I am sitting on to type this was borrowed a few days ago for a large funeral right here of a white commercial farmer who was murdered by robbers. This wasn't political, but the lawlessness from the top is filtering right down and everywhere we have been people report increased lawlessness. Now we have just arrived back in Harare after three weeks of travel to teach in three Doulos leadership training courses at Beira (Mozambique), 900 km west to Bulawayo, then 500 km north to Banket (in the heart of a commercial farming area). We have been updating this by the wonders of modern communications in the heart of Africa, on our missions trip to Zimbabwe and Mozambique. Beira still smells like no other place here! And there has been a major crisis there at present, what with the floods and disturbances. You can follow it on our home church's webpage. Pray for us and the Lifeline team there, who are helping rebuild storm damaged homes.

Our time in Zimbabwe and Mozambique so far has been an exciting time of catching up with old friends and making new ones too. We have already been ministering by candlelight (no electricity in the church), doing extended equipping sessions with a good turnout of local pastors in Beira for three days straight. We then drove the Lifeline 4WD 900 km to Bulawayo, stopping at Mutare Vumba hills (devastated by 260 km/hr cyclone in Feb), Masvingo (where we survived a major engine problem and no diesel for three weeks at the garage the vehicle was being fixed at - to be miraculously given 50 litres in 2 cans to get us to Bulawayo!).

Our sessions in all three programs were well received; an election takes place the day we fly out and the country is bracing itself… The (boarding) school one of our host's son attends is closing and sending all students and teachers home indefinitely, because of concerns for the safety of the teachers. Hard to imagine this if you have only known Aussie elections! Brian's material got reworked as we went along, as we tried to make it relevant to each differing group of students. Quite a few pastors attended as well as younger developing leaders.

Brian's vocal chords became badly infected in the second series and he was in great pain for a week. Could barely whisper, and was saved by a PA system being brought in for the third series. Thank God that the important thing in ministry is the CONTENT rather than the style or delivery of the teacher!

Elizabeth adds; what a lovely place this Banket is. It is a rich agricultural area so in spite of the present economic difficulties, people here are able to grow food for their staple diet - maize (they call it mealie). That's the advantage of living in the country. Most mornings we've walked and prayed along various local tracks, though we seem to spend a lot of our time saying "Hello" and "Good Morning". These rural folk are very friendly and we feel very safe here. It's an interesting thing that although many in the village live in 'third-world conditions', they don't seem unduly distressed or unhappy - in fact, the many children you see on the roads and in the yards are happily playing with whatever. No sophisticated toys here! The one thing that reminds you that all is not well is the high electrified fences surrounding the commercial farms.

This Doulos program is being held in a restored hotel in the centre of this little town where Loxley and the students are staying. A local Christian farmer bought the property some years ago and has made it available to Lifeline for a reasonable sum. Brian and I are guests in the home of the local senior pastor who lives in the village 20 minutes walk away. Each day there are five sessions - very heavy going on Brian's voicebox.

16/6 FROM HARARE We have returned to Harare after the very moving end of the last Doulos series. A wonderful communion time and honest heart-searching discussion about the way forward for us all as leaders of God's people.

The locals have taken to calling Elizabeth - Momma Elizabeth; and it has stuck! They are such an affectionate people. The highlight of each of the 15 session series I have done in each course has been my illustration of what every culture considers "normal" in a friendly, brotherly greeting. I do an exegesis on "greet one another with a brotherly kiss", then ask the young women if they feel comfortable when the young men quote this Scripture to them as justification for a smooch. They look aghast. Then we do a look at differing cultures view of the "normal" way to greet one another in a warm brotherly way.

We start with the Zimbabwean way - a lingering holding of hands (they gasp when I tell them they would be suspected in Australia of being homosexual); then British - formal handshake and crisp greeting; then how Archpriest Khoury (Assyrian Orthodox) nearly crushed me, at home once, in a bear hug and massive kiss on both cheeks with his bushy beard (they can't handle that style at all!); then we do Italians, with lots of shouting and crying and hugging and kissing. I pick a different person to act each out. They gag at this. But the best one is the Kiwi Maori way - they just can't handle rubbing noses!!!

Then we do the hermeneutic - what is the best way we can interpret this NT verse into our current culture and retain the essence - ie. warm, brotherly affectionate greeting? They have the point by then. Then we can do a number on legalism and its Biblical flaws. This has been an effective way of deepening their ability to "correctly handle the word of truth", which is what is notoriously lacking in parts of the church in Africa. All sorts of weird teachings get promoted by leaders.

One pastor told us when he was interviewed by the chief apostle of ZAoGA (not your average AoG organisation) he was told he would have to walk on his knees across the room and kneel before him the whole time. This group also teaches their followers (1 million in Zimbabwe alone) must use the Archbishop's name to act as an advocate when they pray through Jesus. My friend (an ex-RC priest) couldn't get out quick enough!. (top of page)

Trip to Mana Pools Game Reserve on the Zambezi River (Zambia border) (Elizabeth reports) This update comes from Harare where we are again staying with friends. We have come back today from Mana Pools, a National Park some six hours' drive north-west of Harare. We managed to secure sufficient diesel to get us up there, drive around this remarkable game park over four days, and back into this city. We stayed in a large two-bedroom thatched cottage on the edge of a pool on the Zambezi River, with the mountains of Zambia looking like 'folded blankets' as a backdrop - paradise. It was a most relaxing time and after three weeks of being on the go, Brian's health improved remarkably. We were surrounded by wildlife in unprotected surroundings and had our own VERY scary moment when out walking we came unexpectedly across a lone bull buffalo sitting in the scrub. We had only moments before been discussing how an acquaintance of mine (who I met in l991 when she was a YWAM worker in Beira, Mozambique) had been killed by a buffalo in this very same park and area two days into her honeymoon, after they walked into one in the scrub unexpectedly! Needless to say Brian gripped my arm in a vice and we made a very hasty retreat ((as in, ran for our lives into a gully). The bull rose to its feet, but didn't charge. That was our last attempt to go walking in the park unaccompanied. We did go on a three hour trek a couple of days later with a National Park guide armed with an AK47. At one point later in the day, he actually unlocked the safety catch when a very angry male elephant threatened to charge the Land Rover our hosts' family was sitting on top of (on a viewing platform). The children were terrified! Oh yes, they call this fun!

Highlight of the 4 day trip - a 40km round trip over a very rough safari track with very little game, until we eased down into a dry river bed and saw a leopard cub staring down at us from behind a tree. It came out, quite unafraid, and watched us for 10 minutes before its mother called it back into the bush. We also saw lots of hippo (walking right past our lodge), eland, impala, elephants, baboons, monkeys, mongoose, squirrels, zebra, warthog, crocs, buffalo, waterbuck, some bushbuck, kudu, a cheetah (walked past our BBQ on dusk), not to mention being kept awake at night by the racket the lions made, hyena tipping our garbage bins over every night, the grunting of hippos (worse than Brian's snoring), and the vast array of birdlife - from eagles to enormous hornbills. Truly, an assault on the senses!

We now have a couple of days to ready ourselves for our trip to the U.K. where we will spend a few days with my step-father, John Curtis, and his family in Cornwall before linking up with Lifeline's supporting church in London. We plan to stay with Anna Jarvis' parents and of course we're looking forward to seeing her again. It's a year since she left us in Sydney. Brian will speak at a local Lifeline supporting church here in Harare on Sunday. The pastor, Innocent Makwarimba, attended the last Doulos course, and invited us to come and address his congregation. We are much happier going there than to the more American-style church that some of the Lifeline people took us to four weeks ago. We could have been anywhere in Nth America, or Aussie. The indigenous Zimbabwean churches have a particular vitality we love to be in touch with! (top of page)

Election Fever! G'day, folks. A short update you might find interesting. It's after 11pm, and we have just returned from a "township" in the high density area of Harare. It's the eve of the elections and the streets are deserted of cars and pedestrians. That is really unusual here as there are ALWAYS people walking about. It's on edge everywhere. We prayed the whole way over there and back. At the meeting we spoke at, I was just closing in prayer when a couple of truckloads of party supporters drove past the church meeting place (which is a front yard of one brother's house covered in asbestos sheeting and open on the sides and street). Others were walking beside the vehicles. They were chanting slogans in Shona and making a lot of racket. We were really tense wondering if they would trash the place. Afterwards at dinner, one of the leaders mentioned they were MDC supporters and had shouted out, "please pray for us!" I just wish someone had told us what was going on at the time! Would have saved us some very anxious faith-filled moments…

Today is our last day of driving around in the Lifeline vehicle, as tomorrow it has been recommended no one drive around while people are voting. The USA Embassy warned all Americans to stay of the streets tonight and the weekend. We have never been in a situation like this before and value everyone's prayers. Just in case. British Air told us they have moved our departure time forward by 9 hours as they no longer stop over in Zimbabwe. They touch down, disembark, board new passengers and take off again ASAP. All this in such a beautiful land with such a high percentage of Jesus loving people. We love it here and love the people.

All this makes the perils, risks, and hardships of ministry in Oz appear tame! It's weird being here - such a mixture of emotions and reactions, but we are so glad to be here and a part of what is going on. And as we update this at 6am on our last day here, we still wonder why every single day here we have woken up before dawn, regardless of what time we have gone to bed. Makes for a vitalised prayer life! (And the value of an afternoon kip when you can get it!). Lastly from Africa - thanks to all those who have persistently been praying for us - we have sure felt the benefit of faithful, loving friends. (top of page)

TRAVELS WITH BRIAN AND DES IN 1999
My friend Des and I are on a coach travelling from Harare to Bulawayo in Central Zimbabwe. We have been involved in a series of training programs for national pastoral and leadership development. Last week, we were in Mozambique in very different circumstances. The effects of the 17 year long war that ended in 1992 are still very evident there, whereas Zimbabwe is now suffering an economic collapse through cronyism at a high level. I thought perhaps you might be a little interested in the differences between ministering in our part of the world and Africa! So I have attached part of the updates we have been sending home to our church in Greystanes.

Things happen that are very funny from our cultural perspective, while other things bring a sober reminder this is a very dangerous place to live. Even if you don't look at the others, scroll to update #6. That was one of the most horrible experiences of my entire life.

To Everyone back home Update #1 The phone system in Zimbabwe is a mess nowadays, so we are taking the opportunity to send some stuff out at Lifeline House. You know the next bit, "this email is never sent unsolicited. Return with Unsubscribe on the subject line, and we promise never, never to harass or bore you again" (I spoke too soon. The analogue system spat my email out and I am now resending it from Beira the following Tuesday…). Things have reverted to something near normal in Harare. It's quite safe on the streets again. Although Des learned real quick yesterday that you don't act too friendly to the street stall hawkers. One hounded him for ages after he spoke pleasantly to him! We are staying with Dave and Jen Hess, who stayed with us in Sydney for 10 days back in 1993. They have been so gracious to us. Des's (clean, drying) undies disappeared from our room. He was a bit reticent in allowing them to be washed (and ironed!) by a strange woman. But Harriet would have been really offended if he did his own washing….. She washed, dried, and ironed them all over again! I want to know if he is going to take this part of African culture back and try to get Pam onto this system!!!!???? We had to pay $US30 ($A46) each at the airport to get in (it's still like something out of Casablanca!). Dave Hess dropped us off in the queue outside the Mozambique embassy at 7.45am to apply for our visas on Friday. We got near the counter and realised we had both left our extra passport-sized photos at Hess's. Des raced down the street and paid $A15 for a set! Ripped off. Welcome to street dealing! Back in the queue, handing over the $Z850 each ($A34 - another rip-off), in $US when the official says abruptly, "no $US accepted, only $Z!". I also found my Mozambique visa was out of date, and I too had to go and find a photographer nearby. Only paid $A4 for mine, but…. wait for it…. (this is Africa!) didn't notice it ain't Polaroid - you have to wait for it to be developed! Then, after going to the bank for $Z cash, we raced back to the embassy to find the queue now nearly out the door. We sat in line for 2 hours talking with the locals. It was hilarious! The guy behind us was a Branhamite who belonged to the "pure Branham church, which practises polygamy". We went round the mountain with him. Most entertaining (he was 26 and didn't even have one wife, let alone a harem!). Then a fat lady pushed into the queue and lots of people started arguing in Shona…. She was so aggressive she ignored them all and no one knew what to do then. Then we had to come back at 4pm, form a queue again and wait for the visas to be passed out. By now we were old friends with several locals, all patiently suffering the agonies of Mozambicans' love of red tape! And Des is learning what we meant by time being reckoned by the sun being between the horizon and middle of the sky! (Stop laughing, Philip….. I can hear you from here). Des was surprised at the number of locals are genuine Christians. We experienced a wonderful service last night at the Sheraton Concert hall. It seats over 4000 and was full. Our hosts son-in-law led the praise time. They sang in English and sometimes in Shona for an hour or more. You haven't seen anything until you see a three-parts African congregation swaying to the music, dancing and waving large banners, and cheering like an AFL crowd! They love God and aren't afraid to show it. Tomorrow, we drive down to Beira in Mozambique, on the coast 600 km away. They tell us the road is improved, and only sections of it are very rough now (there was a 30cm drop between the seal and the bridge deck at the Pungwe river after the floods two years ago - did wonderful things to vehicles from ends in the dark!). We just had a report that man eating lions are currently active only 10 km from Inhaminga, where Elizabeth, Philip and I went two years ago… It looks like we won't get time to go up the track/road to there this trip. What a pity….. They found some fingers on the track…. That's all.

Update #2 Now we have arrived in Beira after a long dusty trip on the hwy which is being extensively rebuilt above the flood level. You might laugh reading this! It's 6pm and I'm sitting in the dark with a paraffin lamp for light to type this on my battery-powered computer! The power went off an hour after we arrived and has stayed off. This is the first time it's gone off and stayed off for a long time. At least that's what they tell us…. Had a long time of prayer here tonight after dinner by candlelight. Power is still off at 8.30. There was a major in-house theft of money while the Smiths were in Harare while Edmore was in charge. There are no guests here tonight, so we prayed extensively for the situation to become clear. They spent time with the police earlier. The most serious aspect was the disappearance of an office key that will require a major lock change. We have definitely come here in God's good timing. Tomorrow we are spending time with the staff in a study / encouragement session for two hours. We are painting in the afternoon. Then on Thurs/Fri/Sat we do all morning sessions with 35 national pastors. And two night services at the church of one of the main leaders.

Update #3 This visit is very different from the last one. I have just finished quite an exhausting morning of teaching with local pastors (about 30 of them). Many of them oversee several congregations. They are all well dressed; some of them travelled for hours to get here, although most of them live in Beira Des preached last night at a small Church in downtown slums of Beira. By candlelight! He had a tiny podium which held two candles, and he had to be careful not to let the wax fall on the open pages! Could they sing! Vandals had stolen chairs and some of the wooden strips off the benches. The Zimbabwe Consul for Sofala Province was present. Yesterday, Des installed some deadlocks for Martin, after their robbery while they were up in Harare last week. An inside job. One of the workers. They narrowed it down to three possible suspects. Martin reported it to the police yesterday. The police rounded up two of them, took them in for questioning with Martin present, and then beat them mercilessly with batons on the floor. Martin came back so upset he was weeping. He had pleaded with the police not to, but they said this is the way we deal with things in Mozambique. There is a very unusual weather pattern over Beira at present. It has rained the past two nights, and is much cooler than the last visit (same month). Des and I got soaked this morning when we were out praying up the beach road . I prepared the upstairs lounge section for repainting yesterday. And will bog and seal it today. Beira has changed quite a lot in two years. Shops are starting to appear. Even a supermarket is being built! (The area only has i million people!). Although the Lifeline people still drive to Mutare and back to do a big grocery shop for the House once a month (it's 600 km round trip). Even the road is improving, and the shapperzays (local small buses) aren't such wrecks! Houses are starting to be painted; a hotel has been opened, and the old cinema has been restored! There are plenty of mossies around however. The humid weather seems to have brought them out. There's another wreck just up the road. A Japanese fishing boat ran aground just up the road, in a cyclone two months ago, and there it's gonna stay! There are people already living on the wreck! As the surf whacks into it! Tonight, our hosts showed us the video of "The Ghost and the Darkness", a true story set in Kenya of two man-eating lions that terrorised a railway bridge building operation at the turn of the century. We're sleeping with the doors locked tonight! Des and I hope you are all well, and taking nothing for granted in our wonderful country. It is true that you have to travel to the third world to truly appreciate our way of life, and opportunities.

Update #4 Had a great time in a sweaty jam packed room this morning. They literally sang some 12 items! The worship was in 4 languages and was glorious! There are many educated people in this particular church, which is unusual in such a humble building. There were overflow congregations in two other rooms! So a second interpreter stood behind me and shouted into the back room after the first spoke in Portuguese into the main room. Yesterday I took Des walking all along the beach to the shipping graveyard. For one kilometre the beach was covered in turds! There has also been a bad oil spill on the same beach and crude oil has covered much of the low water area. There are some ship wrecks I couldn't remember. We were the only white people in the district and one girl ran beside us shouting mockingly, 'whitey, whitey!' I am reporting her to Charles Perkins when I get home. The Grand Hotel still stinks. We accidently found where they all use as a toilet - in the park over the road behind it. On the concrete paths! Everywhere! Piles of turds! In the street! With signs of urban renewal everywhere, we can't understand why the Municipality doesn't build large basic public dunnies as there is really nowhere for the street people to go...

Update #5 Greetings all the way from beautiful downtown Beira, where the onshore wind wafts those delectable odours away…. Des and I are sitting up in bed at 5am, coz neither of us are asleep. It's a mild tropical night, and the dogs have finally stopped barking outside our open window. Even the mossies have decided it's time to quit. So we have lifted our skirts (mossie nets) and bared our hairy legs to a malaria-infested environment for yet another day! We have two more Ministry Training sessions this morning, from 9 to 12. Des has excelled himself here in what he has ministered. The locals love him! He is a "great father with nine children" so he must be of God. There have been 35 local ministers gathering daily. Many of them oversee multiple churches, but they are very humble men who are keen to learn. We feel quite inadequate among them, as they have been very effective servants of Christ. I caught up with João Madeira yesterday. João interpreted for Philip, Elizabeth, and me last time. He is now working for Feed the Hungry (a ministry our youth group would be at home with!). They are teaching him some computer skills, and he is finally earning a decent wage (by Mozambique standards that is). He is coming to the training sessions today (Sat). We were even able to walk together around the corner to a Portuguese coffee shop! With excellent coffee and a pastry! Well, yeah, they had run out of milk, but this is Mozambique! It cost me all of 27,000 metacais (that's "meta-ky-s, or megabytes, as Philip called them!). Before you fall on the floor at these outrageous prices, it came to $A3….. Early Monday we drive up to the Zimbabwe border (300 km) where Martin and Debbie will buy more groceries, and come home again ("I'm just nicking down to Yass for the groceries, dear, shouldn't be more than 2 days!" Hmmm. We are spoiled, aren't we?…. Des and I catch a bus then back to Harare (another 300 km), stay overnight and then catch another bus to Bulawayo, where we do another 4 day training course with ministers / leaders from the Matabele part of Zimbabwe. (Sat 1pm) We finished today with much joy among the leaders. I told them the British origins of the all-powerful tie and they went into hysterics. I borrowed one, wore it and then blindfolded myself for execution. We had just finished a any-questions free-for-all. This is much different from the last trip. God has really used Martin and Debbie to build cross-cultural bridges, and we have had the privilege of crossing over that bridge.

Update #6 We had the most horrific experience today - 100 km from the Mozambique - Zimbabwe border we drove over a bridge slowly passing a woman staggering about on the Hwy apparently very drunk (the hwys here have people walking beside them everywhere). To our absolute horror, we saw her flesh was covered with African killer bees and they were stinging her to death. I am still shaken 12 hours later. This is a cursed continent. You wear bare feet and they warn you even the ground has worms that hook onto your soles and burrow into your skin to lay eggs. Your washing must all be ironed to stop a fly egg hatching into a parasite that breaks you out in boils. You swim in the rivers and river worm penetrates your skin and eats into your liver and eyeballs. It goes on and on. An African in a ute pulled up alongside her, windows up, as she lay on the ground screaming, and urged her to fall onto the tray. He couldn't get out and one of our party was stung 20 times 100 metres before he got to her; there were swarms of them all over the place. It was terrifying. We were killing bees in the Landrover. But no one else got stung. We could only pray. She staggered up several times and finally fell on the back of the ute, which took off; the driver got out further up the road to help her, was attacked, and jumped back in again, heading off at speed to a town 5 kms away which had some medical help. Whether she lived, we don’t know. The local missionary doubted she could survive the power of the stings. They are very different from our bees. This isn't a fun letter entirely, is it? But it's life for these people, and it stirs my heart afresh to serve them.‹

Update #7 We have spent the last four days enduring sub-zero night temperatures and pleasant 23 deg. days some 5000' ASL 30 km south of Bulawayo on a YFC camp site with 20 pastors from all over Zimbabwe. This is part of their Doulos Training Course. They meet for two weeks five times a year for intensive study and training. Many are in their mid-20's and have already pioneered churches. An AoG minister has joined us from Manchester. He can't believe how cold it is as soon as the sun goes down!

Update #8 I am sitting in a very, very slow train 30 km out of Harare which is running 1 1/2 hours late. Des and I are sharing a second class sleeper with 3 other African men overnight from Bulawayo to Harare. It has been a trip to remember! Why? Well the carriages are all 45 years old; it's squashed, but actually quite comfortable. Except… we are sitting (reclining, lying down, sitting up again) right over an axle or wheel that is out of round! It has a flat spot on it, which has clacked away at about 95 decibels all night! No one got much sleep.

We finished our part of the Doulos Training series Saturday 30km out of Bulawayo, in Southern Zimbabwe. Des and the minister from the UK (who has never been here before either) spent yesterday in Matopos NP, which is a refuge for white and black rhinos. The signs say all people on foot will be shot on sight, and they mean it. Since they shot dead two poachers, no more rhinos have been killed. Des tells me the registered guide walked them through a rhino trail (he's licensed to walk) and they came to within 12m of a large white rhino. After Des and the rhino compared schnozzles, the rhino conceded and they agreed not to charge each other.

Meanwhile, being the spiritual and faithful one (nahh. I said to Des if you have come this far and don't get to see any wild life in its own setting, it would be a travesty!), I stayed at the Training centre for our last time together in a very powerful communion and worship time. We prayed for several who had never exercised in the gifts of the Spirit before. Some very significant declarations came forth about the future of this country and the rôle the next generation of Zimbabwean Christians would play. One young man (Rayman) had a vision that was very biblical and powerful. All this from such quietly spoken young adults!

We met up with Loxley Ford, the Lifeline Director for Sthn Africa and George Moyo - a former Catholic priest, who was baptised in the Holy Spirit while still a parish priest. One of the senior Church leaders tried to have him killed (this is not uncommon in this culture - it extends from the top in politics and some churches and tribal systems). Last night, over dinner, he told us about an ambush during the Zimbabwe war (early 1980's) when Nkomo's soldiers murdered two priests on their mission station; George was having a bath and escaped! They returned later and lined him and several nuns up for execution, when an outside disturbance made them leave in a hurry. George sent 10 of his developing leaders (6 young men and 4 young women) to the Doulos course. They are planting churches out from Bulawayo and they are only in their mid-20's.

Just before we left Harare, our dear friends there took us to a lion and cheetah park 30 km out where they have several magnificent rare black-maned Cape lions. They are full-grown, very large, and quite magnificent in the typical Zimbabwean setting of rocky granite outcrops, bush and long grass.

I hope you have got something from what we've emailed the past three weeks. Our Zimbabwean friends warned us if you come back here you will come to deeply love the land and its people. The Shona and Matabele people are like that. When you greet one another they will hold your hand for 3-5 minutes as a sign of welcome and affection. When they come to Christ, this rich side of their culture translates very easily into genuine christian fellowship. Des and I have loved it! I would have loved to bring home a bunch of them to sing God's praises their way.

Older Trip Reports 2008 2007 2006 2005 2004 2003 2002 2001 2000 1999

2007 Trip #1 April/May Trip #2 Oct/Nov

19/4/07 Update after Mozambique

4/5/07 sent from Bulawayo

ALL IN A DAY’S WORK…

11/5 from Plumtree

18/5/07 from Beitbridge

25/5/07 Final Update from South Africa

SECOND 2007 TRIP 14/10/07 Update #1 - From Chinhoyi

18/10/07 Update #2 - from Gweru

24/10/07 Third Update – from Gweru

31/10/07 Fourth Update - from Harare

3/11/07 Fifth update from Beira

7/11/07 Sixth Update from Harare before leaving

May 30 The journey out...

June 12 Update #1 – from Harare

ODD SPOTS

June 17 Update #2 - from Harare again

Update #3 from Bulawayo

2/5/04 Update #1 – trouble from before we left!

The departure…

And a little further update from Harare after arriving here….

Update #2 from Gweru

15/5 Update #3 after Bulawayo

17/5 (final) Update #4

17/7/03 Update #1 - Michelle reports...

17/7/03 Update #1 - Michelle reports...

20/7/03 Update #2 - from Beira, Mozambique

24/7/03 A few lines later from Brian

2/8/03 Update #3 - from Nyamandlovu, Matabeleland

4/8/03 Michelle reports from Nyamandlovu…

13/8/03 Update #4 - from Victoria Falls

To finish with...

Second Trip - Nov 2003