And suddenly the world has changed . . .

No, I don’t want to tell you about how God has changed the life of one of our Congolese neighbors this time. Those of you in our support network know that I, Miriam, was diagnosed with invasive breast cancer in July in South Africa, joining one out of eight American women, and my sister and my mother only this year. The funny thing is that genetic testing seems to indicate that our illnesses are unrelated.

(What are you doing, God?) I was given 3 weeks to put things in order in Congo and make arrangements for moving to the United States for 8-9 months of treatment. Let me hasten to say that the doctors are very confident that we can beat this.

The opportunity to be close to family was one of the main draws to southern California. Here my mom and I share a bench during a short tour of the LA arboretum the afternoon after my first chemotherapy treatment at City of Hope.

I’ve come, with Ed, to southern California, where my mother and our daughter live, and a whole host of the missionary “aunts and uncles” that I grew up with. We now live in a pleasant apartment with our daughter (a special privilege) two miles from my treatment center and along a bus line that goes there, and we’re making slow acquaintance with our new town, when treatment activities allow it. A new friend has loaned us her car for the duration, actually one of four cars offered us. Thank you, friends, for your generosity!

Still the string of blessings must have needed a spot of darkness for compositional balance. A month ago now, returning on foot from an afternoon errand, I tripped on the edge of some uneven sidewalk and broke my left arm at the wrist badly! Suddenly that changes everything again. Quelle aventure!

The cure has imposed some sacrifices. The hair will grow back when pharmaceutical bombardment ends.

A special challenge is figuring out how to dress my head. Yes, I’m temporarily bald. It’s funny that it should make such a difference to me, working in a country where children, schoolgirls in rural schools and many village women, routinely have their hair cut close to their scalps, but it does. Wrong color of woman for it in my mental associations, maybe. I am using a wig, a hat and a kerchief, sometimes with the addition of scarves, keeping an eye out for winter hats, and eagerly looking forward to growing my head of hair out again at the end.

I am tolerating the treatments well, to date. I mentioned adventure. To me, this is an adventure of new experience that God is leading me through, one not completely unexpected, given medical history in my family, not desired, but then that describes ¾ of the adventures we are given in life.

The sun umbrella and I have become even closer friends during these past ten weeks. The pharmaceutical concoction that the doctors are feeding my tumor causes a supersensitivity to the sun's rays in some people. I'm not taking chances.

I am now ¼ of the way through my treatments, through the first chemotherapy regime designed to stop and diminish the presence of cancer in my body, and, sure enough, there are no signs now of any cancerous activity outside the actual tumor, and that is significantly diminished already. God be praised! Eventually they expect to operate on me, and finish with cautionary radiation before I can go back to Congo in April 2013.

Ed is returning to Congo and Lusekele Ag Center in early November, but wants to come back to support me through surgery and the early days of recovery in January. His absence from Lusekele has coincided with the main planting season and absence of the director, due to illness, from day-to-day activities, and there is much to be done.

Weeks in between my chemotherapy treatments are for recovery . . . of the body and of the soul. My cousin, Carla, administered some soul first aid, inviting Ed and me to tour the Huntington Gardens after my third treatment.

So what does God have in mind for this time? Why did he want to pluck us up out of the work we’ve been doing in Congo right now? The answer could be as simple as time to stop and grow in our lives with him. Or it could be the beginnings of new directions in ministry. In Isaiah 43:18-19b, God says, “Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?”

Multiplying and sharing God's blessings

Philo (in the yellow t-shirt), Angela Boss, and Nadesh (from the Central African Republic) get a warm welcome from the women in Moliambo on Wednesday afternoon.

Late Tuesday afternoon a low engine rumble somewhere beyond the garden and oil palm plantation announced the arrival of a small truck as I packed up things to go home. A few minutes later missionary colleague Wayne Niles appeared on the steps leading down to the office. Not far behind were Miriam and four women, the expected team from Foods Resource Bank(FRB), one of the key partners in ACDI Lusekele's agricultural extension programme. Wayne had driven the team up from Kinshasa to spend a couple of days with the ACDI Lusekele staff and the farmers that they serve.

Wayne, Nadesh, Angela Boss (an FRB growing project coordinator), Amy Beth and Lisa are welcomed in chapel at Lusekele on Wednesday morning. The banner on the wall behind says, "To believe in Christ means to live according to another standard."

Foods Resource Bank is a remarkable Christian movement that helps materially poor farmers to end hunger, improve opportunities and contribute to the health of their local communities. It brings together Christian farmers, fruit growers, ranchers, and other production specialists with other Christians with a desire to end hunger and the poverty that so often causes it. In special "growing projects", North American producers dedicate a portion of their production (500 peach trees or 1000 chickens or 10 acres of soybeans) to the Lord. Other Christian partners contribute the funds necessary to pay the costs of producing the peaches or chickens or soybeans. And very often the growing partners raise even more through donations of inputs from local or corporate suppliers. When the crop or animals are sold the money goes to support 50 to 60 FRB projects working with local churches around the world.

As we all sat in the shade of his palm trees, Mr. Ndundu introduced Amy Beth and Lisa to a token of Congolese hospitality - freshly tapped palm wine (from wild palms down the hill.)

For the last seven years the ACDI Lusekele extension program has been part of one of the largest FRB projects. The support makes it possible for extension agents to make regular visits to over 100 farmer's groups every month. They promote disease-resistant cassava varieties, high-yielding peanuts, protein-rich and drought-resistant black-eyed peas, productive hybrid oil palms, and techniques for soil conservation and improvement. They also encourage sharing of the best agricultural practices in this part of Congo. Through God's gracious alchemy, just a few acres of soybeans at the edge of a golden field in North America becomes a force for change in the lives of Congolese semi-subsistence farmers.

Angela Boss, the FRB growing project coordinator for Western North America, brought Amy Beth, Lisa and Nadesh to meet these farmers and the Christian extension specialists who serve them. Amy Beth works with a California peach grower who contributes part of his crop to FRB. Lisa is member of a Tennessee church that wants to partner with FRB. Nadesh is an African agricultural specialist herself, serving farming women through another FRB project in the Central African Republic.

Early Wednesday afternoon, we left the main road, jolted across grassland, slithered through sandy pits and finally wound our way down into the disappearing forest valleys of the Gobari River. Moliambo is the Baptist church center for the area, not more than a few kilometers from the Gobari itself. Farmers from the local association were waiting, eager to show us the changes that have taken place in their villages.

Amy Beth and two women from Nzombi stand in front of a healthy stand of disease-tolerant manioc. I saw only one diseased plant in the whole field.

In nearby Nzombi, we found the village surrounded by astonishing fields of healthy manioc. Disease tolerant varieties and careful culling of diseased plants have virtually eliminated cassava mosaic disease as a problem in the village. At the Baptist high school in Moliambo we saw 8-month old manioc plants nearly 3 meters tall with stems 3 inches across. Ten years ago mosaic disease was contributing to widespread hunger in the area. Today hunger is little more than an unpleasant memory. The only complaint: sometimes people have trouble selling the surplus manioc for lack of buyers.

Thursday we took the team out to meet the associated farmers of Milundu in the Luniungu River basin. Mr Munimi showed us around his oil palm plantation while his sister looked on. The plantation perches on a hillside above chocolate colored fish ponds. Production this past year had been down due to lack of rain. It is only now beginning to pick back up. Still, he said, the income from those palm trees has helped him to buy a bicycle. The bicycle saves time and helps to carry both produce and water for the family. Palm oil income also helped to put his kids through school. His faced beamed when he told us that three of them were in university right now.

Mr. Munimi, a Milundu palm grower, explains to the FRB team how his oil palm plantation has helped his family.

The obvious pride and joy on Mr. Munimi's face is the real reward of this work we do in Jesus's name. His life would seem poor to most of you. But he values his children. He works hard. His family and people in the village respect him. He has remarkable hope, optimism and satisfaction in what he produces. And he will probably live to see his children enter into opportunities that he never dreamed about.

Angela and Philo say good-bye as the FRB team prepares to leave us in Milundu.

I am grateful to all the Christians of Foods Resource Bank growing projects who have made a conscious decision to store up riches heaven. Their sacrifice, their investments, make it possible for the people here at ACDI to share God's blessing with farmers in this region. Each time God's blessing is passed on (North American farmer to Lusekele extension agent to Congolese peasant farmer to their offspring) the blessing is multiplied. What are the things of true value that you and I will leave behind us in this world?

Is it really all about the dress?

The nurses of the Bilili health center proudly display their banner as they line up for the International Women's Day parade.

March 8th…International Women’s Day… It may have passed you by without you noticing it. Here in Congo it is taken seriously. Girls are let out of school, women employees given the day off, women dress their little girls in their own skirts (I saw a number of girls wrestling with this unfamiliar object), women’s groups go into debt to parade in uniform, and the local government plans feasts and parades, with speeches and such. But if you don’t have new uniforms for your group to show off, why go? That was the question raging in the Lusekele women’s group

Little girls dressed up in their mothers' wrap-around skirts. Parade day!

It wasn’t’ just the Lusekele women. All the women I met at the celebration Thursday were just thinking about the parade, and assuming that the government men would arrange the program. But the county administrators were clueless. They had dutifully arranged the occasion. Now they kept saying, “This is YOUR day, ladies…” That’s how I, who had come to observe this event for the first time, was seized on just before the parade, to be the main speaker. Philo, one of Lusekele’s extension agents and its assistant administrator, as the most capable Congolese woman there that they knew, was also asked to give a few remarks.

Participating in the celebration meant a 15 kilometer walk for the Lusekele women.

As a literacy promoter, I talked about the necessity for a country like Congo to use the skills and wisdom of ALL its population, not just the male half, the necessity for women to learn, to gain the knowledge and skills needed to make a good contribution, and the importance for a family’s well-being and future to have a savvy educated woman directing the household. I addressed all those school girls in their mother’s skirts about the necessity to apply themselves to their studies and use what they learn. Philo hammered on the theme I started, pulling out the adage that educating a man gives him a livelihood; educating a woman changes the world around her.

The Lusekele girls lead the delegation for the agricultural center women.

The real reason for days like this is not the dress, the dance step or the parade. International Women’s Day is a chance to change the way we think in important ways. While Congolese village women don’t find their lives intolerable (unless they live in the Great Lakes region, the current rape capitol of the world), they are limited in many ways which contribute to their poverty and handicap their children. Women are often treated like children and deprived of decision-making, even in such personal matters as whether to have more children. Their menfolk act on their behalf, whether for their good or against it. Beating your wife is considered normal in this society. Lack of education is an important limitation for the majority of women, keeping them first from learning about things that could help them, and secondly from understanding the real advantages and disadvantages of new things. The children of uneducated women are less likely to get a good education themselves. The uneducated woman is less likely to get good health care for her children, more likely to get cheated and victimized. One could go on. Government administrators are perfectly willing to celebrate women, but without any interest in changing the status quo. Women have to take responsibility for the program, to hold up models to each other, to tell each other, their men and their daughters why they must think for themselves, why they must gain new skills, why they must speak out, and why they must be listened to.

Lusekele girls at the annual International Women's Day celebration -- happy for the day off, but still wondering what it is all about.

We need to start preparing for next year’s Women’s Day – not just for the dresses, but so that we all have something to present that’s worth our daughters’ (and sons’) attention.

Helping lay pastors to become more effective leaders

posted by Miriam Noyes

Our pastor at Lusekele, Pastor Manunga, is the guy on the right. Our lay pastor, André Kizima, is the guy on the left. They’ve both just come back from training seminars -- Pastor Manunga as a workshop leader and Mr. Kizima as trainee.

The Baptist Church of Congo has a two-tier pastoral system. There’s the man (or woman) with formal training who provides overall spiritual direction and has primary administrative responsibilities in the local church – the pastor. Then there’s the lay pastor who leads the inquirers’ classes, disciples new believers and often organizes daily prayers. Many local congregations do not have a trained pastor. In rural areas a circuit riding pastor often is responsible for congregations in several villages. It is not unusual for a circuit riding pastor to touch base with a local congregation only for communion, baptizing new Christians and whatever campaigns the denomination has decreed.

You can understand why, for many rural congregations, the lay pastor is the real pastor. He or she leads daily prayers, leads the Sunday service, and organizes Sunday school. The lay pastor leads the congregation and effectively shepherds believers through the events in their lives. It is astonishing that the denomination doesn’t officially recognize lay pastors. Instead he or she is called a “catechist”, following the name of the teaching program for their inquirers’ classes.

Catechists may just be a local school teacher or Bible Study League leader, pressed into service. In 1989 or 1990 a 4-5 week intensive training became available for them. It covers all the bases: a spiritual life manual, an overview of a lay pastor’s work, an overview of the Bible, directions on how to teach the catechism as an overview of the basic knowledge a Christian needs to follow Jesus, what the Bible says to typical problems in African villagers’ lives, worship, preaching practice, church history, with an emphasis on the history of this church in Congo, the organization of the Baptist Church of Congo, and suggestions of appropriate ministries for a local congregation. This course is divided into 5 modules and provides the basics for lay pastors who lack training for the job. It’s been in use now for over 20 years.

In October 2010, Pastor Rubin Ngalubenge, the denomination’s evangelism coordinator, convened a group of pastors in the Vanga area. He pleaded for a thorough revision of the training materials, aiming to improve their relevance to current challenges of the church. The pastors agreed with the need and suggested many changes and additions.

But the group was too spread out to meet regularly for revising the course. Instead, the work fell on a committee of 5: Brother Thomas, the Swiss-German Reformed pastor working in Vanga, myself and the 3 local pastors designated by the Vanga church district as trainers for the program. Our pastor, Pastor Manunga, is one of them.

I did first drafts of revisions in the course of typing the material into my computer. (The last file was on floppy disk, long since lost.) The editing committee discussed and reworked those drafts. Finally, in 2010 and 2011, we tested the first three modules in training workshops at 9 different sites.


The first printing of module 3 is done and the booklet was used in training last week.

The third module, covering doctrine and Biblical ethics, has been the hardest so far. First it was obvious that we needed to redo how lay pastors teach. Most catechists teach inquirers the catechism by rote. Correctly repeating the phrases of the catechism is often taken to be sufficient evidence that a person has made an informed commitment to Christ. Many candidates never do present a personal testimony to the baptism committee. Catechists need to teach in a way that leads the inquirer or new believer to understand what they believe about God, about Jesus, and about living in the Kingdom and why they believe it.

Second, some subjects needed to be added. For example, Congolese in general are very concerned about the role of spirits, God’s protection from malevolent spirits, the role of the Holy Spirit and the spiritual gifts. Surprisingly, none of these are covered in the catechism. Many people aspire to be prophets, but often think of this only in terms of identifying spiritual threats. They neglect the more important functions of building the body, giving God’s direction, and challenging evil with good. With gaps like this how is this church to lay a good foundation for its people? We needed to expand counsel for following Jesus in daily life, going well beyond simply encouraging believers to be obedient members of the church.

Third, some questions were approached only from a Western point of view. For example, responding to the question of physically handicapped people in our families is much more than caring for their needs, finding meaningful roles and preserving their dignity. Congolese want to know why people are born with deformities or limitations and are they “real people.” Another example is how we understand and respond to mental illness. Congolese often attribute it to dabbling in the occult and having things go terribly wrong. Christians need to consider the full range of spiritual, psychological and physical causes of mental illness. The Bible is capable of speaking and should be allowed to speak to believers wherever they are in understanding. We made an effort to find that Biblical interface.

For two months I was working on questions like these. In mid-November the editing committee approved the third module, it was printed, and the trainers gave it its first road-test. Unfortunately our pastor wasn’t able to hold his training seminar then. The pastor of the hosting church was sick in the hospital and they put it off in that site. But last week the pastors trained the second group of catechists in teaching inquirers’ classes and what the Bible says about the problems that trouble their church members.

While we were in church last Sunday morning, Pastor Manunga arrived back home from his seminar. The third module has a lot of material to go through. He and his charges worked hard all week. The catechists were particularly enthusiastic; the seminar covered the core of their work. The local circuit-riding pastor wistfully asked for a copy of the module, wishing that the pastors themselves had more opportunities to improve their practical skills.

André Kizima is the lay pastor of the Lusekele Baptist church.

Our catechist, André Kizima was in a different group. Even though a lot of his fellow catechists didn’t come, those that did agreed that the material was really good. André recognized that their method of teaching in the past had failed its purpose and said he was looking forward to teaching the new way. He waxed enthusiastic particularly about the helpfulness of the lessons on common problems people face. I suggested that when he crosses paths with the catechists that had not come, he invite them to come talk with him about the new material and what he got out of it.

Bible Reading League to field volunteer literacy teachers

A young man in the Bible Reading League reads a passage of the Bible. The League is a dynamic movement of people dedicated to studying God's word and applying it in daily life.

"The Bible Reading League is all about reading the Bible," Brother Lula was telling a small group gathered in the district pastor's living room at Mbanza Dibundu. "But what happens in our Bible study meetings? All too often one or two people read the study passages and the rest just listen. They may not even have a Bible with them. Why? Because they can't read well enough to keep up. We want to change that."

It was a national holiday and the League chapters from all over Luniungu county gathered for Bible study and planning. Miriam joined them because Brother Lula, the League president for the five counties surrounding Vanga, thought that the League could be doing much more to help non-reading members to learn to read for themselves.

The meeting started late and attendance was down because of the funeral of a well-known school teacher in the area. After Brother Lula finished the devotion he asked Miriam to share. "The Bible talks a lot about light and letting light into our lives. The light is equated with God's rule and all the goodness that comes with it. A blind person is surrounded by light but he is unable to see it and take advantage of it. God has all kinds of blessings he wants to share with us. But if we don't know about the blessings we can't experience them."

Miriam shares the vision for local churches helping neighbors to read and write.

She went on. "A person who can't read is like a blind person. He is cut off from a vast pool of blessings that God wants to share, because he doesn't realize that it exists. God's written word shares the message of eternal life, how to live with God now and to eternity. Written words also share the rich experience of thousands of lives that God can use to enrich our lives."

"If I can help someone to read, I help that person to unlock the treasure house that God prepared for them. I can open up the windows of a dark room and let God's light shine in and chase away the darkness. You could do that for members of your local groups or for your neighbors. You can help the blind to see the blessings that God has already prepared for them."

League members planned a literacy workshop for Easter vacation.

For 45 more minutes, Miriam and the gathered League members discussed how the CBCO Women's Literacy initiative could train League members to teach adults how to read or to improve their reading skills. They settled on Easter vacation as the best time for a training. (Many League members are school teachers and can't get away for a week-long workshop except during vacations.) Local chapters will provide food for the participants. The CBCO parish at Mbanza Dibundu will figure out a way to house everybody. And the Literacy initiative will provide the trainers and training materials.

Thousands of people in the Vanga area get along without reading and it would be ridiculous to say that reading is essential to life. But illiteracy is like living in one small room of a large mansion. Reading is the key that opens the doors to all the other rooms. Imagine the blessing you would experience helping someone explore the mansion -- and pray for these League members who will attend the literacy workshop in late March or early April.