April 2008 Update

When I first visited Tanzania in 2006 I met a man named Bahati. Bahati was born in a small lakeside fishing town called Baraka in the Democratic Republic of Congo - formerly called Zaire. When Bahati was just a young boy he and his family were forced from their home by civil unrest, guerilla warfare, and brutal violence. They, like hundreds of thousands of others from that area of Congo, fled to the stable shores of Tanzania. These displaced peoples of Congo were eventually gathered together and placed into refugee camps within the Kigoma region. It was at the refugee camp in Lugufu that I first met Bahati, not knowing that the Lord had a plan for our paths to cross again.

Bahati Alphonse

While visiting the Lugufu refugee camp in 2006, I was asked to bring a message of encouragement from God’s Word. When I first arrived, the pastor from Kigoma who escorted me to the camp brought me into the mud-brick church building and sat me down next to Bahati and explained that this young Congolese refugee would be translating for me that day. He then went on to explain how the people there at the church - about 250 in all - did not know what time I would arrive to visit them, so they had gathered together around 8:00 AM that morning and began singing and praising and encouraging one another as they waited. I arrived at 3:00 PM. Our brothers and sisters in Christ, Bahati included, had been patiently and joyfully awaiting my arrival for seven hours!

Lugufu Refugee Camp Church

To hear of their patient endurance and joy in waiting for me to arrive, and then to experience it firsthand in the ensuing worship service, was a life-altering experience. They wanted to hear the Word from their brother from the States, and they were excited and determined to do so. When is the last time that I or anyone I knew was passionate about the things of the Lord that way? When was the last time you were excited and determined to hear the Word and fellowship with the brethren no matter what the cost?

After the service I spoke with Bahati and he told me about his home town in Congo, and how he hoped to return there some day. He told me how he had been spending his time in the refugee camp studying the Bible and how he hoped to take God’s Word back to his home. Here was a man who had been forced from his home, his village, and his country; forced to live as a refugee within the confines of a camp in a neighboring country; not allowed to work and earn an income to support his young family, but completely dependent upon the limited staples provided by the U.N. to sustain his life and the lives of his family; and living this way for years... and the primary thing he was concerned with was learning the truth of God’s Word and taking it back to the Congo.

The following year, in 2007, we finally made it back to Tanzania. This time we were their to stay. I immediately went to visit one of the ministries I would be working with - a Bible College in town. To my surprise I found a familiar face there ready and waiting to start learning the Bible... Bahati.

Since I had last seen Bahati he had been repatriated back to Congo. There he found his former town and home in shambles - almost nothing left. He and his family settled in and began to try and make a way to live. Then he heard that there would be an opportunity for him to fulfill his dream of learning God’s Word and bringing it back to his people, so he saved up and found a way to get a visa and a boat ride back across the lake to Tanzania.

Bahati is one of our best and brightest students at the Bible College. Almost every week he says to me, “Excuse me Pastor. When do you think you can come and start a Bible School in Baraka? You are most welcome. Please come.” I have to hold back the tears as I type. I wish so badly that I could look him in the eye, give him a big hug, and say, “Right now! Let’s go today!” To be surrounded by such a great need and to be so limited as a man to meet it brings anguish to my soul. We’ve barely even scratched the surface of the need in Kigoma, and yet all around us in Tanzania, Congo, Burundi, and Rwanda, the need is the same if not greater. “Therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.”

In all the years I ministered in the States I rarely met a soul who truly longed for the Lord and His Word. I rarely met a soul who would joyfully and diligently sacrifice in order to wait on the Lord and receive from Him by His servants, His Spirit, or His Word. Now I see it every day, and I cannot do enough. Please pray for the people of Tanzania and Congo, that the Lord would bless them in their patient perseverance and earnest desire for His Truth to set them free.