A Mission that Matters

Macha International  Christian School This morning we took a tour of MICS (Macha International Christian School) with Dr. Berkerk’s wife Tamara, his brother Otto from Holland and Otto’s wife Lois and Corie. The boarding and day school was established in 2006 by the Brethren of Christ for Zambian children, including orphans, vulnerable children and local expatriates. Charlotte and Reece Thuma attend the school.   The school serves preschool through 7th grade students and provides a solid curriculum. Last year, 100% of their 7th graders passed exams to move on to next level.  Once again, we were struck by people from across the world who are motivated to serve and make great sacrifices because of their commitment to Jesus Christ.   Push the Rock Zambia When Dave was here in 2014, the addition to the Push the Rock Zambia recreation center — funded by NHUMC — was just beginning. No...

The Macha hospital was established in 1954 by Dr. Alvan Thuma. While he was bringing medicine to the area, he also led the effort to make and fire bricks for the construction of the first hospital in this region. His challenges included lack of modern medical tools and traditional doctors (whom we would call witch doctors, who people trusted when they were sick).   Jaeron DeBoe, wife of James DeBoe the head doctor at the hospital who practices surgery and family medicine, gave us a tour.   There was a new dentist chair and dental assistant who does extractions and has begun filling cavities. As we continued our tour, Jaeron noticed a local women sitting on a bench in obvious grief. Jaeron put her arm around the woman and asked what was wrong. She pointed to the bed behind us and there lay the body of her infant under a blanket. It was a heart-breaking and helpless feeling. There is still great need in Macha.  But there is so much going on here that is posi...

When going to Africa, people tend to say, “I am going to Africa.” But people on the continent prefer to say that one is going to a particular country. It was clear yesterday on our drive from Lusaka that Zambia and Malawi are very different places. Walking to church We got to the Brethren in Christ Church Macha at 10 a.m. There were services before that starting at 8 a.m. for holy communion, baptisms and foot washing. We waited outside meeting local Zambians, an ophthalmologist from Holland and his family and a doctor who supervises the hospital and his wife from Virginia.   It was a special Sunday with a service for 16 local churches, and we had to wait for seats to become available. We got seated at 10:30 a.m. and the service concluded at about 1 p.m. The music was beautiful with songs sung in Tonga, but most of the tunes were old gospel hymns that we recognized. Along with other first-time guests, we were asked to stand in front of the congregation and sa...

On the way to the airport with Israel and Ian. They loved wearing our sunglasses!  Gibozi picked us up at the Baptist Mission Apartments with his whole family — his wife Esther, seven-year-old Israel and two-year-old Ian — to take us to the airport. What a gracious and attentive host he has been.   Farewell at the airport.  Our flight from Lilongwe to Lusaka, Zambia via Harrare, Zimbabwe went very well. Corie and Eric Thuma met us, and we began a six-and-a-half hour drive to Macha. They had been on a vacation away from their children for a week and were very excited to be reunited with them.   On the ride we talked about mutual friends at NHUMC and Willowdale, mission work and strategies and other topics like Philadelphia sports teams, social issues, life in Macha and our experience in Malawi. It was great to get reacquainted. They informed us that we wouldn’t be staying in the guest house as we thought, but instead in Dr. and Elaine Thuma’s hom...

It was nearing lunch at the conclusion of our meeting with some UPI executive directors and Gibozi Mphanzi looked at the two of us with a flash of insight, "So, this is why you came!" It was obvious we had hit on something important. We thought we had come for two reasons: (1) for Nancy to experience the wonder of this place and the presence of God in these people and their work, and (2) to perhaps help in the dedication of the new YouthCare high school, that the NHUMC Christmas offering had made possible. But before we left the U.S., Dr. Bruce Main, the founder and president of UPI, had asked Dave if he would speak to some of the executive directors about leadership and to thank and encourage them in their good work. Dave suggested to Bruce that since Nancy had significant experience in marketing and communications, including in the non-profit world, that she might have some valuable insights for the team. So this morning, Dave and Nancy met with Gibozi (YouthCare Min...

Today we visited Cornerstone Ministries about an hour and a half east of Lilongwe near Lake Malawi. When Dave was here in 2014, Cornerstone held their ministries for children in a rented home and in public school buildings. But Cornerstone was one of the ministries that had not yet built nor begun building facilities to house the ministries on their own land.   As we began the day sitting in that same rented house with the Cornerstone team — Danneck Falinya, his co-leader Leo Chanza, Tionge Matangula and Chikonti Chirwa, who all spent two years as a fellow in the U.S., and two younger leaders, Glory Munthali and Chikondi Khabaka, who may be fellows in the program next year — we talked about how they are doing so much with so little. Cornerstone faces the ongoing challenge of providing the resources needed in a fast growing ministry.   This year they had to make the choice between buying books or taking the summer camp children on a trip to Lilongwe, which had been ...