Over the past four weeks, I had the privilege of meeting some of the people God is using to transform Africa. I don’t use the word “transform” lightly.
Consider: the fastest growth in the number of Christians over the past century has been in sub-Saharan Africa. In real numbers, Christians in sub-Saharan Africa grew from fewer than 9 million in 1910 to more than 516 million in 2010. The share of the total population that is Christian climbed from 9% in 1910 to 63% in 2010.
My wife and I experienced first-hand this amazing growth and its consequences for four years as missionaries in Ethiopia. We just returned from a new and different vantage point in Zambia in central Africa.
My Impressive Students
I was invited to teach an intensive class in preaching to second-year students at Justo Mwale University in Lusaka, the capital of Zambia. This seminary offers a four-year Bachelor of Theology degree to students training to become pastors. My class included four women and nine men. While the majority were Zambians, they also came from all across central and southern Africa—Zimbabwe, Malawi, Botswana and South Africa. Some are already ordained with years of experience; others were in their early 20’s.
As I did with all my students in Ethiopia, I offered personal appointments outside the classroom with each student to get to know them personally and hear their stories. All 13 accepted my invitation. These were rich conversations!
A standard question was “How did God call you and bring you to Justo Mwale?” Several told detailed stories about all the hardships faced and obstacles overcome—they were clear that God opened the way for them to be there. One student was so excited, he literally talked non-stop for 30 minutes while I didn’t say a word!
As in many African countries, pastors are minimally or infrequently paid. Students spoke of taking “sustainability” courses to make ends meet, like growing vegetables or the wives of pastors learning sewing or tailoring. Unlike most pastors in the US, these students will be “posted” by their respective denominations into congregations near or far, small or large, without any input or choice about there they are going. That in itself takes faith!
Students grew up in vastly different personal contexts, from urban churches near the school itself to very primitive-sounding rural villages. Several were the first in their families to receive education beyond high school.
Most envisioned becoming local pastors, often overseeing multiple congregations or “prayer house” outreach gatherings that grow into new churches. One woman, however, plans to seek a Ph.D. in biblical languages as an example to other women. Listening to them express their hopes (and sometimes fears) for the future warmed my heart.
Their comments in our class discussions convinced me they take their calling to be preachers and pastors seriously and believe God is personally at work in their lives, churches and nations.
Engaging The Faculty
We experienced warm hospitality, as five Zambian faculty members invited us into their homes for an evening meal over a two-week period. All were local pastors for a good portion of their careers before becoming academics, definitely enhancing the pastoral training focus of the school.
One told me that his advanced education was completely funded by a leadership scholarship from the Presbyterian Church (USA), my own denomination. Exploring the timing of his degrees, it was gratifying to realize that my California congregation’s mission giving was supporting this man I highly respected.
In addition to full-time teaching and many administrative duties, most of these men had served, or were currently serving, in the very top leadership roles as Moderators or General Secretaries of their denominations. Stretched thin between basically two full-time jobs, they were inspiring examples of tireless servants whose efforts have achieved so much for the growth of Zambian churches over the past 30 years.
Finally, being in these homes impressed me again, as I constantly was during my years in Ethiopia, about the African commitment to family. Every one of these households was overflowing with people in addition to Mom and Dad and their biological offspring. Some cared for aging parents, but all had several additional small children they provided for and sent to school, either grandkids or the children of extended family members who now lived with them.
When a family “makes it” in Africa, relatives near and far expect to share in their success, especially financially. From a western perspective, we might say this is allowing others to take advantage. Indeed, so many additional mouths to feed and school fees to pay does create real burdens for families like these. However, I find it sobering how their commitment to community and sacrificial sharing contrasts so vividly with our increasingly atomized society where so many extended families end up broken and adrift.
In the US, we exalt the individual and a zero-sum “if I win, you must lose” mentality to our collective peril. Africans in general and African Christians in particular have much to teach us.
More to Come
I will be sharing much more about what we learned and experienced in our travels throughout Zambia outside Lusaka in my regular email newsletter next week. If you would like to hear more and are not yet a subscriber, I invite you to join the list—just click here.
You & Marilyn, Dusty& Sherri, and your students have been in my daily prayers this last month. I’m so glad to hear it was a blessed experience.
Rich, it was so good to read about your experience in Zambia, and to view photos from Dusty.
Since joining Peace Lutheran Church in Grass Valley after Linda’s retirement three years ago, I have also made an African connection.
For the past two years I have chaired a Committee which has supported a ministry in Rwanda since shortly after the genocide in 1994. Consequently, I now have a good friend who is a pastor in the Lutheran Church of Rwanda, who has had amazing success helping his parishioners to rebuild their communities and reconcile with neighbors who had victimized them. He was in Grass Valley this weekend to speak at an event we sponsored to help fund a full scholarship for a Rwandan student to attend seminary at Makumira University in Arusha, Tanzania.
I believe the future of the Church may well be centered in Africa, much as it became centered in Europe centuries ago. I hope to go there in the not-too-distant future.
Blessings,
Jim