Veterinary Team from Lake Charles, LA

The veterinary team from Trinity Baptist Church in Lake Charles, LA consisted of three people: Dr. Kyle Hebert, Mr. Rusty Sittig, and myself (Katherine Bonvillain). Dr. Kyle went ahead of our group a few days to buy cold vaccines for Lumpy Skin Disease, which we had been informed in advance was a big issue with herds in the community where we were working.

Treating animals in wooden shoots made of tree branches is hard. We all got banged up a little from the cattle and being pushed up against the wood.

There were days when the cows were pushing us around and dragging our mood down, but the people were a joy to see. They came and drove the cattle in and worked along side us. They came with hands ready to work and hearts ready to listen. Their respect for Dr. Kyle's position and help led to an eagerness and willingness to listen to the Gospel he shared. Over and over again we were astonished as they asked for us to talk to them, and then after we had, they would almost all raise their hands and ask to pray to receive Christ. Also, those that were already Christians would ask to pray with us in unison or for us, and watching those men get down on their knees and bow to pray was more beautiful than any view of Victoria Falls. During our 6 days of work we saw over 3,200 animals, predominately cattle, also sheep, goats, dogs, and donkeys. We spoke with hundreds of people, and around 300 prayed to recieve Christ. Serving in Zimbabwe has been an honor, a privilege, and a blessing.

One day Dr. Herbert heard about a man who had a sick cow who was about to slaughter it so he went to check on it. He was able to treat and save the cow. Then Dr. Herbert told the man, the reason I am here treating cows is so I can have a chance to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with the owners of the cows. The man listened to Dr. Herbert’s testimony and prayed to receive Christ. The man was later chosen as the lay-leader for the new church formed in his area.

Katherine Bonvillain shown above with her father Robert Bonvillain who worked on the construction team in Zimbabwe.

U.S. Construction team helps at Baptist Seminary

A construction team from Trinity Baptist Church of Lake Charles, LA recently came to Zimbabwe to help with some repairs on the Baptist Seminary property.

After unloading their tools they did an assessment of the work needing to be done and compared that with the building supplies with which they had to work. This turned out to be a real challenge for the team. Almost daily they made trips into town (the seminary is about 15 miles outside of Gweru) to try to source basic building supplies. Often they could not find exactly what they were looking for, but they always managed to come up with a plan to accomplish their task!

Connor Fry is a university student and the newest member to join this volunteer construction team. The others have been on previous volunteer trips.

The team found working out of a trunk instead of a toolbox a bit interesting. It seemed easier to just dump it all out and dig through to find what one needed.

Earlier this year a storm took the roof off of one of the student housing duplexes and did damage to another seminary house roof. The first project was replacing and repairing these roofs. (Robert Bonvillian is seen here on the roof.)

Connor Fry and John Davis found that one of the houses required brick work before the roof could be completed.

Dr. Dick Landry (a doctor on the Trinity Team) and Gregg Fort went out to the seminary one day to check on the work. After the roofs were completed, the team moved over to spend their remaining time beginning on the needed repairs on the seminary chapel.

While Robert and Todd painted the chapel roof with vinyl paint to extend its life. Ron Ritter, John Davis, and Connor Fry stripped off the rotten underneath ceiling board on the front porch. Then they put on new ceiling boards.

And painted them.

All in all a job well done.

CELEBRATE!

Gregg and Donna Fort have been celebrating for many different reasons!

They are celebrating their 26th year as missionaries in Zimbabwe working in partnership with the Baptist Convention of Zimbabwe. Recently they shared in a very special day of celebration as friends were united in marriage.

Another celebration, which has been long in coming, is the celebration of the Open House of the new house for the pastor of Mkoba Baptist Church. Ever since the church building was completed, it was the desire of the church to build a home for their pastor. However, due to economic hardships it has taken the church awhile to have the money to build the house. With great joy a large crowd of well wishers from the church gathered for the ribbon cutting ceremony.

As the speeches were given, umbrellas came out everywhere to shield people from the hot noonday sun.

Pastor James Tembo, the Executive Director of the Baptist Convention of Zimbabwe (in the middle reading his Bible) was there to stand with the deacons and Pastor Jeffrey Ncube (to the right of Pastor Tembo.) Pastor Tembo also prayed for the Ncubes, the church, and gave a prayer of Thsnksgiving for God's help in making this possible.

After a brief tour of the house, many of the church members gathered around Mrs. V. Ncube (pastor's wife in brown suit) and danced and sang with her in celebration.

In Africa, there always seems to be something to celebrate about!

Reaching the Unreached Ndau of Zimbabwe

One of the “unreached” people groups in Zimbabwe is the Ndau who live in the mountainous area of Zimbabwe’s eastern border with Mozambique. Three years ago Gracelife Baptist Church from Christiansburg, Virginia decided to adopt these people. During their previous trip to Zimbabwe, a church was planted at Zamuchiya. There are about 20 people who attend regularly, and 14 of them were baptized recently by Pastor Manyanga from Chipinge Baptist Church. Though quite a distance from Chipinge, the new church members and leadership from Gracelife were invited to attend the Easter meeting recently held by the Chimanimani Baptist Association in Chipinge.

“It was a great time of teaching, encouragement, and fellowship,” said Pastor Tim Hight. “It was amazing to see how God orchestrated it all through the inspiration of His Holy Spirit so that the separate preparations done by various people who taught at the meeting (from both Zimbabwe and the U.S.) all dovetailed together.”

Associate Pastor Gary Long came with Pastor Tim and also participated in the programme.

A vibrant youth group came to the Easter celebration and sang for the group.

Families participated in the meeting, and even the children sat and listened for hours on end!

One of the biggest challenges church planters in Zimbabwe face today is that the old mindset and methodology are not reproducible and the growth of our churches has stagnated as a result. The idea that a church must meet in a “church building” and be led by a “seminary trained pastor” greatly reduces the number of churches one can expect to plant. Now that a church has been planted at Zamuchiya, the church planters from Gracelife’s next goal is to model for them how to evangelize the lost in their area to grow their own church and to reach out to the neighboring villages to plant churches there that will do the same. In this way many people will be evangelized and churches may be reproduced more quickly. This means churches may need to meet in school buildings or even under a tree. It also means that church members must all be active participants in church life using their spiritual gifts for the encouragement of the brothers, teaching of the brothers, and reaching out to the lost. Three more teams are coming from Gracelife this year to help facilitate this learning process.

When Pastor Tim Hight was asked what he perceived to be the greatest challenges he gave quite a long list! The top four were: • Learning to navigate the church planting process in Zimbabwe. • Finding what limited resources are available for the churches to use. • Learning where to plug in and when to pull away. • Trying to keep the excitement in his church going for 5-10 years to ensure they are able to complete what they started. When asked what he would like people to pray for concerning the Ndau, he said, “Pray for a spiritual awakening among the Ndau and the birth of a true church planting movement.”

Teacher's Testimony Amazes Students in Lesotho

Lesotho (a tiny country within South Africa) is currently rated second in the world for new infections of HIV virus. Even though our journeygirl Jennilee Phillips has completed her time in Zimbabwe, when she left us she went to spend a week in Lesotho and she has written the blog below for us about her time there: While in transition back to the states, I was given the opportunity to go visit my friends in the country of Lesotho. While there I was given the opportunity to continue my ministry of teaching True Love Waits. I had no idea what was in store for me there! Because HIV/AIDS is epidemic there, this teaching is extremely important, but also, the gospel is desperately needed. The school heads wanted the teachers to hear the presentation before it was presented to the students. I believe the teacher’s eyes were opened and they knew this material 'must' be taught to the students. Since I was leaving on Wednesday, and I taught the teachers on Friday, it only gave me 2 days to teach all the students. I showed up on Monday ready to teach! They basically told me they wanted me teaching the entire school and that there would be 6 classes with about 40 students in each class. Since I had 2 days left in the country, I split it up and taught 3 classes each day. After teaching only 1 class I was ready to hand the teaching over to someone else because I was losing my voice. I was worn out from talking for an hour and knew I had 2 more hours left! I knew everything I was presenting was so important for these kids to hear and all the examples I was giving and how the gospel was intertwined was so so important that I didn't want to sacrifice the Gospel and truth for my comfort.

The next day I went prepared with plenty of water and snacks. This was the day the Lord really showed me the reason I came and it blew me away. The day before, I met a teacher who said he was trained in teaching True Love Waits and I was not able to talk to him much at all the day before so he said he would go in with me the next day and help in teaching and giving testimony. He was a young married guy and was very excited to show me the True Love Waits cards he and his wife signed a few years prior. I asked him to please share his testimony with the students.

The kids were blown away with this teacher and the commitment he made and I could really see in their eyes they now looked at him in a different light! I was so very thankful because even though I was leaving, I knew he was staying and these kids could ask him any further questions they had. He was also very bold with the gospel and the kids asked some tough questions that he and I answered from the Truth of the Gospel. I left spiritually full that day, knowing the students heard truth and very encouraged when many of the kids asked for purity commitment cards to sign. I was also extremely thankful for national partners who love the Lord and are committed to sharing His truth. Praise God that though my time is short, God had a plan to continue this ministry after I am gone.

Pastor's Conference

In late March, 2014,leaders from churches in the Mberengwa Insiza Baptist Association came together at the Neta Orphan Caring Center for a time of discipleship and teaching. The conference was set to begin Monday morning, and we arrived promptly at around 10am, only to find that we were the first ones there. Not unusual for Africa. However, we discovered only after arriving that the participants would only be coming late in the afternoon, since they had to take care of homes, fields, and livestock before they could come. The participants finally began arriving late afternoon (Africa time, for sure!), and we were finally able to begin the first session just before dinnertime in a nearby school classroom. Ten men and nine women from these churches gathered, and sat for two days under the teaching of Rev. Steve Skinner, pastor of Carroll Baptist Church in Southlake, TX.

Pastor Steve and Rev. Ricky Davis led the participants through an in depth study of the book of Ephesians, focusing on their responsibilities as lay leaders of their respective churches. Missionary Ramona Beam and another member of the Carroll Baptist team, Traci Cooper, led sessions for the women based on Proverbs 31 and Titus 2.

In these sessions the women were encouraged to be mentors to the younger women in their churches, teaching them to be women of God as they minister to their families and churches. Pastor Steve took us through Chapter One of Ephesians before breaking for a delicious meal of sadza (a paste made of mealie meal—corn meal for those who have never been to Zimbabwe), chicken, and greens.

After the dinner break we gathered again for more teaching, finally stopping to sleep at about 9pm. Everyone was up early the next morning, eager to hear more. After a breakfast of bread with margarine and jam and potato soup, the teaching resumed, this time in the open air under a tree since the children were in school and the classroom was not available.

The participants were reminded of these wonderful truths from Scripture: that salvation is by grace alone through faith in Jesus Christ; that our strength comes through Christ; and that we must walk in a manner worthy of our calling. As leaders of their churches, these lay pastors were called to live godly lives as examples to those over whom they have leadership.

Goodbye Jennilee Phillips

Jennilee Phillips has been such a blessing to the Zimbabwe Evangelism Team during her two years as a journeyman in Zimbabwe.

She has enjoyed building relationships with the youth at her church and with the girls she taught True Love Waits to in the schools.

We loved it when she cooked tasty meals for us!

She is not afraid to try a new hairdo.

Or let a missionary kid teach her how to flick matches.

She is always in touch and asking for advice or giving words of encouragement.

She has been equipping leaders to take over teaching after she leaves.

We are going to miss you Jennilee! It may be pretty boring at our next team meeting! Love from, Ramona Beam, Mark and Angie Byler, Gregg and Donna Fort, and Barry and Marleen Robinson.